Analysis of Rock Videos 2 - Post 6

The 1975 - The city

MISE-EN-SCENE

The styling in this video is very rocky as the people in the video all wear quite simple and dark clothing which gives them a sense of danger. The use of bare skin with projections is a very interesting idea that provides a simplistic illustration of what the artists are talking about while still keeping the same colour scheme thats used throughout the video. The performance in the video is very angsty and the artists facial expressions and body language makes them look very stressed and angry at us as they look into the camera which is effective because we can feel the pain they are feeling as we look at them. The body language of lots of the actors in the video shows struggle or difficult emotions as the men fight and two people are passionately kissing which tells us that both of these situations are similar in the fact that they are products of highly emotional feelings. The main artist also uses his arms lots and brings them up to his face which connotes that he is feeling sad and angry about what he is singing about. The lighting in this video also creates a very obscure look which causes us as audience to become uneasy and unsure about what we are viewing.

EDITING

The editing in this video is very quick and matches the rhythm of the song, the quick cuts are conventional to this sort of video because the angsty song is very all over the place and often rock videos will have quick cuts to keep the tension levels high so that our hearts are beating very fast while watching the video. Throughout the entire video there are some sped up parts and some slow motion parts which I think works well in creating a very chaotic feeling as the cuts are very jumpy. The slow motion parts help to create a more sad feeling because it is though they are struggling to say something.

SOUND

The soundtrack continues throughout the entire video and the events of the video match the rhythm of the song and as the song becomes more tense and the beat becomes stronger the events also become more tense and emotional to show us that the emotion they are singing about is very real.The music itself is very punchy in places which tells us that this is a rock song that is about mixed feelings. There is no other sounds of the people in the music video so it is as if the song is the angry sounds they are making while they are fighting or arguing and I thought this was effective because it is like the song is showing the reckless things they are doing to the rhythm and its like this is the sound they are making rather that adding in diegetic sound that is actually what they sound like?

CAMERAWORK

The camera work in this video ranges from close ups to extreme close ups of parts of people that are very obscured to confuse us and keep us guessing at what we are viewing and what is about to come up on screen. The extreme close ups are very effective because they show very fine details of what the artists are wearing and this gives a very realistic and gritty view on what we are seeing. The shots showing us close ups of the band performing works very well because we can see what they are like when they perform and this is conventional for a rock music video because this shows us that the artists are more about the music rather than in pop videos where there is more of a concentration on the artists or the dance routines, it gives this video more of a down to earth feeling.