RepresentationThis presentation will aim to show how

my music video uses, challenges or develops the Narrative theories

surrounding music videos.

Intertextuality

Intertextuality involves creating meaning by means of another text. Julian Kristeva states intertextuality as ‘the shaping of a texts meaning by another text’. Intertextuality is a huge part of many postmodern media texts, and it’s use can significantly alter a persons interpretation of a media text such as a music video.

In terms of my video, there are many different examples of intertextual references. For example, I use Duct Tape in the video which is an intertextual reference to the documentary DVD film ‘The Duct Tape Messiah’ which details the lift of the late folk singer Blaze Foley. It is also an intertextual reference to the original song by Kings of Leon ‘Reverend’. This is because that song was supposedly written about the lift of Blaze Foley.

Hozier – Take Me To Church

Hozier take me to church was a big influence on my music video. I used many visual features from within that video and tired to apply them to my own video. For example, the close up of the church fence and the reverend was an idea that was inspired from this video. The screenshot of Hozier’s video is on the left.

Though the use of the bars is not identical, I felt the bars help to represent the confinement in which the characters feel within themselves. They can also be a visual symbol of prison, suggesting society views that characters as in the wrong. Hozier’s character is gay, meaning he could be behind the bars to highlight his religion views this as wrong. Developing this idea, my Reverend is filmed on the outside of the bars,, highlighting how he is separated from his religion because of his smoking and alcohol tendencies.

Hozier’s video also provided me with inspiration for the silhouette like shot. This lead me to the conclusion that shots such as the one in Hozier’s video and the one in my video represent how the story/plot of the video is not specific to an individual, but how it’s generalizable to a mass number of people.

Furthermore, Hozier's video also represents smoking as a possible escape to the protagonists problems. If the protagonist is worried about receiving abuse due to his sexuality or in the case of my video worrying about being accepted into his religion, then smoking is portrayed as a possible escape/coping mechanism.

Radiohead - Daydreaming

Many narrative music videos are often concluded my the protagonist walking away from the camera. My video meets this convention, however it also includes footage of the protagonist waking away from the camera during the video too. People often question the relevance of this, and some people are actually very critical about the use of this kind of footage in the early and mid sections of the video. Upon seeing Radiohead's music video for their song Daydreaming, I began to understand the representations of such shots. I concluded that these shots in which the protagonist is followed from behind or walks away from the camera is representative of them going on a journey. In most cases, this journey is both literal and metaphoric. For example in Radiohead’s video, the character is embarks on physical journey as he walks from location to location. However the journey is also symbolic of someone daydreaming as it is fragmented and doesn’t always make perfect sense. In the case of my video, my character too embarks on a literal journey as he walks to the church. However he is also embarking on a mental journey to solve the inner confrontation he feels.

Within the walking sequence, a pub named ‘The Monks Walk’ is visible. This represents the metaphorical journey the reverend undergoes whilst also being somewhat ironic because it’s what’s physically happening on the screen too. Monk has connotations of a religious figure, whilst walk has strong connotations of a journey.

Ted – The Film by Seth McFarlan

Ted provided inspiration for my video. This is because a teddy bear is universally associated with feelings of love, youth and innocence. However, the film Ted completely subverts these conventions. In a similar way, a religious figure is usually represented as wide, innocent and morally correct, yet my portrayal goes against these conventions. Ted’s rebellious side is reinforced through iconography such as recreational drugs and drinking. In a similar way, my video uses these conventions to emphasise the distinction between the portrayal of my reverend, and the portrayal of a stereotypical reverend.

Feminism & The Portrayal of Women

Laura Mulvey (1975) argues that the dominant view within media texts is masculine. The female body is portrayed to create erotic pleasure for the male (voyeurism).

In my music video, there is no such portrayal of women, because there are no female characters within the production. However, even if there was, I would have avoided using this convention because I feel society is increasingly coming to terms with equal rights for both males and females, and the objectification of women is not as prominent or as acceptable as it was 50 years ago.

In a video which relies so heavily upon youth culture, no references to sex is somewhat surprising. However, I felt adding a female character or at least a masculine POV would decrease the empathy the audience feel towards the protagonist, and I didn’t want to risk diverting attention away from the message I was trying to highlight within my video.

Stereotypes

Stereotypes are said to enhance realism. O’sullivan defines a stereotypes as a process of categorisation and evaluation. Stereotypes are shot hand for narratives because they supposedly show us the basic representations within a media text.

Baring this in mind, my video challenges stereotypes to deliberately make the audience question their preconceptions. However, it could be argued that as the video progresses, the portrayal of the reverend become more in tune with what audiences would perceive as stereotypical. This is because at the end of the video, the reverend can be seen in church and referring to his bible and crucifix.