We compare two music videos, Katy Perry's "last friday night" and Eminem's "Stan"

1. TASK 3
Stan- Eminem
Genre and style
Dear Stan is not entirely typical of the Hip Hop genre, first of all the music video tells a linear story,
atypical compared to most Hip-hop videos witch either represent ideals or just portray the main artist.
The first three verses are not even sung by Eminem, they are sung by Stan, very atypical as it lacks the
Star power most hip-hop music videos do.
While Eminem features heavily in the music video, it is hardly ever in person, usually showing up in
pictures on the wall or in videos Stan keeps. Unlike most Hip-hop videos, his appearances are very
unglamorous, him just sitting there. The reason for this lack of glamour is that the point of the video was
to show him as a normal person, and he should not be put on a pedestal. The lack of colour is not entirely
unlike many hip-hop songs, as a lot of hip hop does have bleak elements inside it, but the practically
monochrome colour scheme in this song Is still pretty different compared to most Hip-Hop videos.
Codes and Conventions
One things inferred through codes is the fact
Stan wears white clothing. While this is to stay
as close to Eminem as possible, it also shows
how unstable he is, as in western culture, white
can represent insanity, such as the white of an
insane asylum.
The colour blue is used to represent loyalty, so
when Dido’s character wears a blue shirt and
Hoddie, its showing she is loyal and courageous.
It especially shows her loyalty to Stan,

2. When in the car, Stan refrences Phil Collins “in the air of the night”, a song about how a man could have
saved another from drowning, but let him die by inaction. Stan claims eminem did the same to him, could
have saved him from drowning (both metiphorical and literal), but by not replying to his letters, let him
die.
Another reference is in the chorus, taken from the song “thank you” by Dido, who features in the video, it
says:
My tea's gone cold, I'm wondering
why
I got out of bed at all
The morning rain clouds up my
window
And I can't see at all
And even if I could, it'd all be grey
But your picture on my wall
It reminds me that it's not so bad
It's not so bad
The song is about having a bad life, but having that one person that shines through it and makes you feel
better. In the context of the song by Dido, this is a good thing, but in Stan, it takes on a darker meaning,
showing how for Stan, Eminem and his music is the only good point in his life. Contrasted slightly in the
Dido sings this, meaning it might be that Stan is the only good point in her life, but we know so little of
her character that its unknown.
While Eminem raps the entire thing, the lip
synching is done by the actor who plays Stan.
This is atypical of the Hip-Hop genre as it
does not show the main artist as much as it
could of. It makes sense in the context of the
story though.

3. Narrative
The story of dear Stan is simple, the start of the story is Stan Dyeing his hair too look more like Eminem
and his girlfriend (played by Dido) starts an argument with him, claiming he has “gone too far”, after this
Stan retreats into his basement, more or less a shrine to Eminem. After this each verse is a letter or voice
recording Stan sends to Eminem, telling him that he is his biggest fan, and that his life revolves around his
music and life. After Eminem replies, Stan is driven to madness, and after his girlfriend finds an image of
Eminem pasted on to a photo of her and Stan together, Stan ties her up in the back of her trunk and
drives off the road into the water, drowning them both.
The narrative is very linear, only jumping backwards in the form of flashbacks, and moving forward
through time through the song.
Representation
This is a rare example of a Hip-Hop video that
vilifies putting people on a pedestal, so the
representation in this video is lower than it
would be in other ones, but you can see that
Eminem’s face is almost always in the shot,
especially when Stan is writing his letters in
the basement, where there are hundreds of
posters of Eminem, while it works in the
context of the song, it is also to advertise his
face through the video.
Another example of representation is how
Eminem looks during the concert, the high
angle shot puts him literally above everyone
else, giving him a sense of grandeur and size.
Eminem takes on a slightly different
appearance at the end of the video, the use of
glasses and position indicates intelligence, and
his words go along with that, I hesitate to use
the word wisdom, but that’s the image that
seems to be created, representing him a lot
more mellow as he usually seems
Camera angles

4. An overhead, impossible shot, (made possible by
lack of ceiling). Shows the separation between
our two characters, Stan and his girlfriend.
A standard medium shot, with lightning showing
the lunacy of Stan’s basement. Lighting draws
focus to the desk, a focal point in the music video
The focus in this shot is on the letters he writes,
many of which seem unsent. The focus and the
purposeful walk show the watcher that he
intends to write another letter
A symmetrical medium shot, or two shot, as
opposed to the standard rule of three medium
shot. Made to show duality or conversation. In
this case the duality between Eminem and Stan,
Stan is looking into a mirror and seeing Eminem,
showing that he wants to be him.

5. Over the shoulder shot, with the girlfriend in focus, showing her in thought, followed by a similar over the
shoulder shot with both of them in focus and Stan shouting, once again showing his instability
A Low Angle Arc shot. Meaning the camera was pointing
up at the actor, and moving in a circle around them, puts
focus on his face and the words he is saying/thinking. It is
usually used to signify mental or physical prowess,
showing them bigger than they are. But in this case the
distortion of perspective serves to further show how
unhinged Stan is.
Stan wearing white as opposed to the rest of the crowd’s
black makes him stand out. It does not really show in the
picture due to cut-off, but rule of three applies here too.
Stan is standing in the middle of two equal sized groups.
This shot is done slightly low angle, showing his
vulnerability at this moment, as he comes face to face
with his idol

6. The close up shot of Stan’s collage, him and his girlfriend, with his girlfriend replaced by Eminem fades out
into Stan and his girlfriend’s bedroom, with his girlfriend taking the same position on the screen as Eminem,
once again showing how Stan would rather Eminem be laying there than his girlfriend. The fact that the
room is obscured by darkness further creates a dark atmosphere.
During the entire “Stan destroys his room”
segment, random frames keep on skipping. These
skipped frames give a feeling of panic and madness.
As well as this it suddenly speeds up and slows
down, giving the same idea in a less subtle way
Another two shot. This time its Stan in the reflection, for the
first time, its Eminem that’s thinking too much about Stan.
So he comes up in the window, showing how he is haunting
Eminem, he is a metaphorical or literal ghost, haunting
Eminem’s thoughts, with how things could have been
different

7. Katy Perry- Last Friday Night
Genre and style
Katy Perry’s last Friday night is pretty typical of the genre, her poppy style is drove home by her use of
bright neon and pastel colours, that can be seen in her other videos too. Unlike many modern pop songs,
this entire video
seems to focus on
the 80’s, we can see
this from the
clothing styles and
use of 80’s stars
(Corey Feldman and
Debbie Gibson as
the parents, and
Kenny G as Uncle
Kenny, as
saxophone artist).
This creates both a
dissonance in the lyrics, where she sings about the internet, and uses terms that did not exist at the time,
such as epic fail, as well as a dissonance in the video itself, where she uses a Nintendo Wii to play just
dance, a game that came out in 2009.
The reference to previous era is not entirely atypical of the pop genre, and has done before with videos
such as “shut up and dance” or “true survivor”, both of which take place in the 80’s (a very over the top
80’s), but are written in the 2010’s.
Rather atypical of the Genre, and in
fact any genre, is the fact that this
video is shot like a movie, not only
does it feature credits at the end, it
opens with a wide camera shot
similar to a movie, and the shots
used a very cinematic, trying to
capture the feeling of the 80’s.

8. Even the chorography alludes to the 80’s, with the characters in the video doing dances such as the
robot, that gained traction in the late 70’s, as was still popular into the 80’s.
The song is not overtly complex in its meaning, it’s about getting to drunk at a party and forgetting what
happened, trying to piece it together from all the things that you see when you wake up, the video shows
this, starting after the party had already finished, and goes along to show you how the night happened.
This entire song is chocked full of allusions to other artists, not
just music artists either. The parents are played by Corey
Feldman and Debbie Gibson, Corey Feldman is best known for
playing mouth in the goonies, a classic 80’s film, Debbie Gibson
was an American singer songwriter in the 80’s. As well as this
the video featured Kenny G as Uncle Kenny, Kenny G was a
famous saxophone artist that came to fame with his album in
the 80’s. From these references alone you can see the creator
of the video wanted to pack as many 80’s references in the
video and they possibly could, so all the adult characters are
played by 80’s stars, furthering the 80’s motif.

9. The younger characters have obviously had to be played by younger artists, so we have Issac, Zac, and
Taylor hanson playing themselves in the band Hanson, and Kevin Mchall and Darron criss, of glee fame,
both also play charicters, as well as Rebecca black. This allusion to otheer artists and actors is mostly
comes down to who katy perry knows, or who was under the same label, Having Rebeeca black play a
charicter may be an allusion to her most famous song being called “Friday”, sharing the theme of Fridays
with this song.

10. Codes and conventions
Kathy herself is filled with conventions, her wearing
retainers, having ill-fitting glasses and messy hair all
go towards indicating one thing, she’s a nerd. This
stereotype was especially prevalent in the 80’s,
explaining the look further considering the entire
video is set in the 80’s. More than one character also
has the classic conventions of a nerdy character
Everet (Kevin McHale’s character), is another
character with nerdy conventions, the same ill-
fitting glasses, suit shirt and suspenders (sort of
fashionable now, but less so in the 80’s) and braces,
admittedly without the retainer, but still has all the
conventions of a “nerd” character. He even dreams
of fantasy, showing him to be even more nerdy
This character is not given a name, but simply by
looking at him we can assume many things, him
wearing an American football jersey lets us assume
he is athletic, his haircut and demeanour are all
conventions pointing towards him being a “jock”, due
to the 80’s theme of the video it makes sense, as this
was a style and a group of people at the time
When Kathy changes clothes, it is not immediately
shown for a modern viewer what has changed, but
rest assured, this was a legitimate style in the 80’s,
the perm and Lycra crop top were more “popular”
styles. This shows she by wearing them, has become
more “popular”

11. Narrative
The narrative of this story is relatively simple, but is nonlinear, it starts near the end of the story, with
Kathy (the main character who Katy Perry plays) waking up long after the party finished, and trying to
piece it together, thinking about the party last night, it then flashes back to before the party started and
explains how the party went down. Starting at the end and then flashing back to the start makes it a
nonlinear story. It eventually goes back to the end, finishing slightly after the video started. They may
have done it due to the fact the song is about
with someone waking up and forgetting what
happened the night before, so starting with
that same idea means it syncs up with the
song, and also encourages the viewer to watch
the video, as they too will wonder how the
house ended up as it did, especially
considering how nerdy the main character
looks, meaning she would not be likely to host
such a party.
Representation
This video is atypical of the genre in a few respects, it is very movielike, and so instead of
being herself in the video (or at least what she wants to be viewed as), Katy Perry is
playing a character, that does not relate to her in real life. So despite her having a
clear and defined style in the other videos, this one shows her as someone completely
different from her predefined personality she shows in other videos. At the same
time, it is recognizable as her, and thus the video can be said as promoting the
artists simply due to the fact she plays the main character in it, and thus shows
up more than any other character in the video. For those who watch this video
before knowing about the artists, they would assume that exaggeration is
happening, but I think would also assume the awkward persona was genuine,
despite her being very confident in all of her other videos.
Male/Female gaze theory
Male Gaze theory states that any form of media that has conventionally
attractive woman or men will sell better with the opposite sex. We can see this
video appeals to both woman and men, with attractive characters in either
group. Both Katy’s character and The jock are both examples of male and female
gaze theory.

12. As with many pop videos representation is
very important, Katy is shown consistently
throughout the videos, with many close-
ups of her face in several different
occasions. Despite being nerdy and
awkward in the videos, these close-ups
are very obviously pandering towards the
male gaze, witch while it makes sense
within the context of the video, is still an
example of male gaze theory. Her strong
use of neon and pastel colours shows her
to be vibrant and fun loving, an
impression she continues to show through
other videos. The large use of pink
obviously indicates femininity, and she
does play towards the femininity a lot in
her videos.

13. Synergy
The music video was obviously sponsored by the video game just dance, despite the game, and it console
(the Nintendo Wii) not existing when the story is set. This may be either to garner popularity for both
brands, or due to just dance paying the creators of the video to feature it in the video. At any rates fan of
the game are more likely to check out the video, and vice versa.

14. Camera angles
The video starts with an establishing shot of the street
the video starts off in. These are designed to show the
audience where the action is taking place. It is a very
wide shot that follows the paperboy
This close up puts focus on Kathy, Katy Perry’s
character, it’s a standard close up, and introduces her
character as she talks. This transitions into a shot-
reverse shot. In witch two characters have a
conversation, and the camera switches between the
two of them to show who is talking or to show
reactions
This transitions into a long shot, showing how much of
a mess the room is in, as well as establishing a whole
body shot of Kathy and the rest of the characters.

15. A two shot, showing how Everret is in love with Kathy,
and the close up two shot is used to show closeness
between the two character in the shot. Obviously this
shot is fantasy but it shows in his head that he is
interested in Kathy.
Another two shot, this time show the comparison
between Rebecca black and Kathy, one is nerdy and
unsociable and the other is sociable and popular, having
that party round her house. The duality between them
is in how opposite they are to each other
This is an extreme close up shot, these are usually either
used to show something happening to the face of a
character, or to show their expression if it is important.
In this case the extreme close up does both, it shows
how she is having her lip waxed, and then shows how
painful it is.

16. This is a medium shot that pans upwards from Kathy’s
feet to reveal her new style slowly. This in the context
of the video causes the viewer to slowly take in what
has changed in her new style.
A medium close up, as this is another star to add star
power, the camera focuses on Kenny.G, showing him
playing saxophone (as this is what he is usually
portrayed with, thus it is more easily recognizable as
him) The close up lingers and allows us to realize who
it is who is playing
Another two shot, this time, no duality is being show,
but it shows the relationship between these
character, without even being told you can assume
these are Kathy’s parents, just from their demeanour
and the way it is shot, the fact it is a medium shot
allows us to see both of the characters, as they are
both famous and adds even more star power to the
video, and as the shot lingers on them for a very long
time, we can recognize them easier.

17. Conclusion
Katy Perry- Last Friday night
Katy Perry’s video is made like a movie, thus it avoids many of the hang up’s of its genre, it is instantly
more interesting that many other pop music videos, due to it being shot cinematically and having an
actual story instead of just showing off the main artists. The fact that Katy Perry plays a character in the
video is very atypical of the genre, as she does not get to show herself off as she would in other videos. I
think this makes Last Friday Night very different from most videos in the pop genre, and lead towards its
popularity.
Eminem- Stan
Stan is similar to Katy Perry’s video in that it tells a story, though Stan is far more linear. The dark tone of
the video and legitimately dark and frightening story aided towards its popularity, it does not focus on
Eminem, instead focusing on a completely unrelated character who is obsessed towards him. Unlike most
hip hop these means that the video is very unglamorous towards the idea of idolisation, thus gained
popularity due to its cinematic style and unconventional story.
Comparison
I think both of these videos strived to break through the conventions of their genre, and not only
succeeded, but thrived. both videos being shot cinematically I think lead to their popularity, but the tone
of both were so massively. different. Stan was dark and ended on a low note, while Last Friday night was
a feel good story. Last Friday night was much more of a “safe” video, it was pretty much guaranteed to
succeed due to the popularity of the song, while Stan’s dark tone and serious story was a risk for Eminem.
Stan also did not accept advertisement, as it was too dark of a subject to be paid by a company for it, but
Katy Perry accepted advertisement in the form of just dance. Despite Katy Perry’s video being shot more
cinematically, Eminem’s shots had more meaning, and created meaning in the words and song, while Last
Friday Night mostly had shots for the sake of them, to establish characters and places, and show what
needed to be shown, and little else.
In the end Stan had more meaning than last Friday night, but Last Friday night had a much higher budget
and was incredibly ambitious in its scale and idea, with more stars and cameos, as well as a bigger set and
more effort, I think both videos have merit in that sense, they do very different things.