This music video analysis discusses Rihanna's 2013 music video for "Stay" featuring Mikky Ekko. It summarizes that the video portrays a sadder side of love and heartbreak through Rihanna's vulnerable and emotional portrayal as the main protagonist. Scenes of Rihanna undressing and in a misty bath represent her emotions, tears, and feelings of restriction in her troubled relationship. While the video challenges conventions by not overtly sexualizing Rihanna, it still supports the dominant perspective of women as weaker through high camera angles on Rihanna and her reliance on the male character expressed in the song's lyrics.

1. Music Video
Analysis: Rihanna –
Stay ft. Mikky Ekko
Holly Elsom

2. Rihanna – Stay
ft. Mikky Ekko
• This song was released in 2013and was recorded by
Rihanna and Mikky Ekko who produced Rihanna's album
Unapologetic which this song featured on. This is a romantic
love pop song but focuses on a sadder side of love and
heartbreak within relationships.This is portrayed through
different types of editing techniques, camera angles,
charactertypes and narrative structure.The video looks at
gender representationsand the media language helps
constructurethese ideologies. With music videos being a
way to relate the artist to their audience, Rihanna has
achieved that in this music video with the realism and
emotion. This music video was released 4 years
after Rihanna went through and abusive relationship with
Chris Brown which creates a more emotional atmosphere
within the video especially seeing her bare faced and alone.

3. • The music video starts by introducing Rihanna, from behind
the same way Mikky is introduced further into the video. This
reveals her to be the main protagonist and by introducing
them from the back it relates them to each other and suggests
they are back to back, not seeing eye to eye. A Typical love
song music video convention is to have a lot of skin showing,
which in this music video is the case for Rihanna, however she
is presented as vulnerable rather than sexualised. We see her
undressing with close up camera angles which make the first
focus of her character her tattoo's. The representation of the
star tattoo down her back could suggest the idea she
has goals for the relationship which is implied with the audio
codes with the lyrics quoting 'I want you to stay'. The impact
it has on the song ,of Rihanna being naked, is that she is
completely open within the song and honest. It shows
her vulnerability and creates a fragile effect. However, with
Mikky being fully clothed, it creates a gender unbalance
between the two. Laura Mulvey's male gaze theory could be
applied to this video, in terms of representation of characters
and genders due to the narrative structure and camera angles.
This can be applied to the lack of clothing on the female
supporting the theory as a naked woman would have been
used to satisfy the male audience with the male character
being fully clothed. However, this ideology is subverted due to
the female being naked in the bath representing innocence
and emotion, possibly using the water to represent tears and
depression suggesting the extreme close-up camera angles on
the bath running at the start of the video.

4. • By quickly jumping from scenes of the female undressing and the running bath water, it can relate the water to her and
represents her emotionsand tears. The lack of sexual objectification towardswomen is further represented by Rihanna's
positionbeing crouched at various parts of the video suggesting she is protecting herself.
Despite the theory being subverted, the non-sexual representationof the female characterRihannaplaysstill supports
the dominanthegemony as the idea of the male gender being dominant in comparison to the weak female character
portrayedby Rihanna.The audioand technicalcodes both suggest the female character is weaker than the male as she
sings 'I want you to stay' and 'I can't live without you'. It could show her as reliant on him. When analysingthe location
and iconography,both Rihannaand Mikky Ekko are set in the same locationbut different rooms. Where Rihannaremains
in the same room and bath the entire video it conveysrestrain and restriction showing how she feels towards the
relationshipand the problems she is having. The bath could also hold representationand by a release of stress for the
woman who is clearly stressed and could be trying to calm down in a bath. The waterin the bath is misty so
is representationalof their relationship aswell which is unclear.

5. • Although the male characterappearsto be in the same building they are in different
rooms, or not there at the same time. This is shown by him being next to the bath,
being the same bath, the female character was previouslyin could imply in terms of
narrativestructure that they are singing at different times or perhaps continuingwith
the idea of a failedrelationship,they are in the same room with the same bath
but don't see each other anymore. With the locationexplainingthe narrative, the
lighting also does as well. The lighting in this music video if mainly natural,dark or
dull. Thisdullness in lighting could mirror the dullnessin the emotionsof the characters.
The dark lightingmay be a reference to the darkness in their relationship – relating back
to Rihannaspreviousdark relationshipwith Chris Brown. The naturallighting being
revealed from outside could be suggesting that the character believes happinessis
outside of this relationshipthey are in. Iconographyis used within the setting due to the
use of colours being naturallike the wood and plants. This is representationalof realism
and how nothing is superficial. The use of gold on Rihanna'srings and the mirror and
taps could be to pursue the narrativeof their problems. It could suggest that although
their relationshipis failingthere is still hope for it.

6. • Another typicallove song music video conventionthis video
follows is the multiple close ups and extreme close ups of the
artist singing. However, these tend to be sensual and to draw in
the audience whilst making eye contact. In this video,the close-
up and extreme close-up camera shots of Rihanna'sfacial
expressions and bare face explains the narrativein terms of the
ideology of heartbreak in relationships.With her no makeup and
strong emotions, she represents sadness, and this is developed
further by her having bloodshoteyes suggesting she had been
crying which is proven by her tear fallingown her face at the
end of the video. She seems distracted as she doesn’t alwayslip
sync and sometimes stops half-waythrough a sentence showing
her mind is somewhere else. The panningshots reveal how direct
address from her is not often used. This challenges the
conventionsas stereotypicallythe artist would sing all the lyrics.
She rarely makes eye contact with the camera, only a couple of
times throughout the whole video which suggests she can't look
the audience in the eye which represents the idea of guilt and
distractions.The camera angles show her to be weak and
vulnerablewith the majority of shots on her being high
angle shots. This supports the stereotype of women being weak
and submissive support Mulveystheory again. This is supported
by the camera shots on the male characteroften being mid shots
or low angle shots, implying the male gender is dominantin
comparisons to the female. He also manages to hold more eye
contact with the camera than she does.