1. VIDEO CONTENT
ANALYSIS
Purpose of analysis: to find out the key elements which are consistent in
the genre of music and in the music video I am analysing. The genre
being Indie Rock.
2. Key Elements:
Starts of in the main characters room, he is
laying in bed, it then cuts to a woman in a
field, back to the guy then to a flashback
again.
At .16 seconds it cuts to a hospital hall way
then back to the woman. A lot of fast paced
editing is used here to cut between the man a
woman, who I'd presume is his mum, to a
church, police sirens and a church until the
man wakes up.
3. So far it is all filmed in the main characters house as it then
cuts to him and his probable father sitting at a table
eating. The fathers clothes are dirty and he drinks from a
beer and leaves, leaving his son alone at the table,
possibly linking to a sort of ruined family.
The dad goes to a car whilst his son looks at a video
recorder at old videos of his mum I would presume. In
these we see both the mother and the child shown look
happy, compared to the present time of the video where
they all look miserable.
4. It then cuts to a TV in which the artists of the song are playing and
singing. The dad laying on the sofa asleep whilst it is playing, at this point
the lyrics say “see you again” which may be conveniently ironic for the
situation as he isn't paying attention, also maybe linking to the fact that he
is oblivious to his sons sorrow and sadness over the mother that isn't
there, most likely dead.
The dad then drives of and leaves the son at the table, the son looking as
though he has some sort of disability due to the fact that he hits himself,
possibly touretts. The son closes a book that he was previously writing in
and sits on top of a caravan smoking (most likely marijuana considering
the title of the song)
5. The TV is then shown again with the band on, conventional for the genre as indie videos tend to have the artists in a
lot, in this only a number of times but usually in the chorus parts, making them more significant as they are shown at
the important parts of the songs.
The main character again is watching the video recorder, watching a video of himself and his mum, this being a key
feature as he is always looking back at the videos, showing maybe that he is unhappy with his life currently so is
trying to remember back to the past, whilst getting high at the same time. Marijuana also having relaxing effects so
possibly helping him calm down too. Whilst watching the videos he is visibly happy too.
The dad then walks in after finding the joint, to which he reacts by throwing it at him and hitting him several times
leaving the kid scared.
6. After the dad leaves he lays on his bed and looking at the ceiling. Everything in
the room starts levitating after this as does the kid, he then sort of teleports or
dreams himself into a snowy forest, where the woman in the videos appears
making, concluding the idea that it is his mum because as soon as he arrives he
starts smiling and the mum covers his eyes, he then turns around and they smile
and hug each other, he then cries.
It cuts back to him lying on his bed, so not actually going anywhere, showing
that it was just another flashback or dream and nothing actually happened.
The diegetic sounds start again as the video ends as you hear grasshoppers and
various other normal sounds and the kid just lays on his bed.
7. Conventions of genre:
In the video there are many instances in which it links back to the genre, firstly with it being filmed in a normal house, this being conventional
because usually for indie music videos they are low budget so aren't in big areas or venues in which it would be expensive and houses usually
anyone has, making it a cheap video to film but also having the needed effect, such as the narrative being a key principal in the video.
As stated narrative is an important feature in indie videos and also a convention as usually the lyrics in the song would have a narrative
without a video, so with one it helps to show what the song is trying to portray, as with more affect as the story is obviously more prevalent
and obvious.
There is also a specific theme in the video, the theme being that the kid gets high to forget about his family ,life and to remember back to
when everything was fine and his mum was there. This enhancing the overall effect of the video adding a more of an emotional factor as it
makes the audience feel and sympathise for the character or empathise as a lot of people that smoke weed or do drugs in general do it to get
away from their life and be happy.
The lighting for the most part of the video is bright also, and the song peaceful; a large contrast to what is going on in the video with it
showing abuse and disability as the running themes throughout.
Editing is used in the video to help show the narrative and of the main character feels, conventional for the genre as usually editing is used a
lot in indie videos to help show the narrative.
Camera work in the video also is conventional as they are usually not too varied and consist of long shots and close-ups, some mid- shots and
establishing, the reason for this being that it helps to set the scene of the video and show the narrative and the characters. When it showed
the band they were all close-ups also, showing they were the main artists and making them relevant to the video.
The performance by the actors and the artists was also looking very passionate and realistic as you could see that the singer shown cared for
what he was saying by the sad or emotional look on his face and obviously the actors were as the story/video was about them.
8. Conventions of form:
There are a lot of repetitive frames or the same thing happening again but in a different video, e.g. when the guy
looked at the video several times and the TV with the artists in the video throughout which is a convention for
music videos as they tend to repeat when it is the chorus or an important part of the video to help with a
narrative, this not just in indie music also.
Fast past editing is also a convention because it shows a certain theme in the video, maybe for a certain emotion
or to show many things at once.
Camera work also is important as in all music videos it is used to help better portray what they are trying to
show, so for a pop video they would focus a lot on the artists e.g. with Taylor Swifts Blank Space video it focuses
on her and the guy she's with showing her as the most important thing in the video, so with an indie son git
would be the narrative or the band. So for the convention for form here it would be that the camera work mostly
always focus in the most important parts of the video.
With mise-en-scene also the costume and make-up link to what is happening in the video, as well as props. This
being an obvious convention in all music videos as the props help to show a narrative and show the character in
whatever way they need them to be shown.
The video overall tends to link to the lyrics in a lot of music videos, so showing a narrative in 2 different ways
depending on the video and the song etc.
9. Conclusion:
Overall I have found the key conventions of my genre and the form of the music
video in which I analysed. This helping me in the future as it's made it clearer
what the key elements in an indie video need to be as well as the conventions of
genre and form, for any music video. This helping me in the future as it makes it
more obvious after analysing the video what I need to work on in my own video
to make it conventional for both form and genre. It also shows the areas that I
need to focus more attention on, such as showing an obvious narrative and
where the setting should be etc. This all helping me to see how to make a video
and what is needed in one to make it conventional to an indie video.
