My Music Video Idea - Narrative and Genre

The idea that I will be doing for my music video will be of the Romance genre. The basic story line is that our protagonist, a boy suffering from a break up, will be walking around to different locations ( looking sad ) where he has memories of being with his now ex-girlfriend. As he looks at the locations E.G. Park bench, he will have a flashback memory of him and his ex girlfriend when they were still together, showing them being happy/ loved up and having a good time, then it will cut back to real time, and he will continue to walk around. Eventually he will  have the chance to get back together with his ex girlfriend but in a tiwst he will turn her down and will then end up getting together with a new girl with the girl in a slightly subverted-stereotypical love story manner.


The Genre of the music video is a stereotypical boy/ girl romance told in a less stereotypical manner. The story will focus on a couple/ ex couple and will be a classic love story being interfered with some problem, but by using a fragmented narrative, the love story will be told in a different way.

The Narrative of the Music Video Will be fragmented as while the Protagonist walks around looking at old locations where he has memories of him and the antagonist (ex-girlfriend), he will be having flash backs of that memory and we will then show him spending time with her in the past. So as opposed to a classic Linear narrative we will tell the story in a fragmented manner using memories.

Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe.

I am looking at this video From Carly Rae Jepsen's 'Call Me Maybe' and breaking it down into Genre, Narrative, Representation, audience and Media Language. The video clearly comes under the Love/Romance Genre. You can tell this right from the very start as it evident that Carly Rae has a crush on the boy she is looking through the window at. Also in the same scene there is a close-up shot of some books on a table which are romantic novels, the front cover of one of them is later represented by Carly Rae and the man in the video when she falls off the car and starts dreaming.

The representations of this video at first glance are rather stereotypically of a girl falling for a boy, which one would assume would lead to them eventually getting together by the end. However, this video hits us with a plot twist right at the end where it then becomes clear that the video is actually representing the 'romance' in a subverted stereotypical way by revealing to us as viewers that the man in the video is actually gay and has no love interest in Carly Rae, Thus showing to us why he showed no real attention to her antics.

The Narrative of the video largely is just a case of seeing her lusting over / trying to get the attention of a man that doesn't seem to show any interest in her in return so the video is being narrated by her in a fairly Linear sense by the way she tries to win him over. This changes however when she falls off the car and starts dreaming, as in her dream she is with the man and they are about to start kissing, much like the cover of the romantic novel seen previously, so the narrative takes a turn towards fantasy and we see what it coud be like if they were together.

The audience for a video such as this would most likely be for fans of pop music, as it is clearly a pop music video. you can tell this from the bright colours/clothing and Carly Rae's bright Make-up. The slightly generic beat of the song is also a give-away as it (or something similar) is present in many a pop song. One final reason for this would be that it plays out a fairly stereotypical 'romance' which would also be associated with pop music perhaps due to the upbeat nature of the Genre.

M.I.A Music Video - Representations.

This is a good video to look at when talking about representation as it challenges the main stereotypes that you would normally associate with the culture portrayed in the video. The people in the video are mainly Arabs or people of Asian ethnicity, a culture known for it's strict rules and conservative way of life. This video challenges this stereotype in such a way that the people in the video seem the complete opposite of strict and conservative. Throughout the video, you see the people dancing, wearing bright colours and doing crazy things like Driving cars at high speeds on two wheels while people balance on them. This is all a Subverted stereotype as in some places in Asia is is illegal to even own things such as music CDs and other things like it, so the fact that everyone is dancing, singing and having a wild time shows that they are breaking from the Norms of the culture as it definitely something that would never normally occur In many countries across Asia. So to conclude it can be said that the people being represented in this music video are people of Asian ethnicity and are being positively represented in a way that is a subverted stereotype and shows to us that their culture is not as strict and conservative as the stereotype of them might lead us to believe.

Short Film Tips

Representations.

The person being represented in this video is a young woman who could be a metaphoric representation for the difficulties faced by younger generations in this day and age as it is get increasingly harder to make a living for oneself. So in that sense this is a negative representation as the girl in the video is homeless and sleeping on a park bench with nothing but shabby ripped clothes and a duvet to sleep under. The video represents that hardships the girl has to face. Looking at her face, you can see her eye make-up is all smudged and running down her face which shows she has been crying and is actually crying at one point in the video. This highlights the desperation of the girls situation once more acting as a negative representation. There is a slight stereotype of people that live on the street in the way that she is selling the 'Big Issue' magazine or something like it, which you would usually associate with a homeless person. Further the negative representation, the girl then turns to prostitution to try and earn some money coupled with the use of drugs. This could be seen as a partial stereotype of todays younger generations with the excessive use of Drugs or even sex to get things that you want. More negative representation can be seen when you think about how she lives on the street with barely anything to live by, but the second she gets some money, all be it from a dodgy source, she then spends it on Drugs rather than essentials such as food,drink, new clothes, ect. This shows us that she is stuck in a vicious cycle of addiction amongst other things.

Conventions for the Action Genre.

Main Conventions- The main conventions for a Action genre film would include such things as:

• large explosions
• Gun fights/ Fist fights/ other sorts of conflict
• Large, butch men (usually), Skilled fighters 
• Car chases
• High Tempo
• Hectic 
• heavy sort of music to accompany high action scenes
• Attractive women

These are just some of the things that came into my mind when i think of the main conventions that would appear in an Action film.

Semantics associated with this genre would again be things such as:

• Guns
• Fast cars
• Drugs
• Hench men

examples of the sorts of cars usually used in this genre are cars like Ford GTs, Mustangs and Ferraris.

the sorts of people would usually be rather muscly, Tall and fast.

Syntactically an action film would begin with something more calm, where the character will be introduced to allow the audience to get a feel of the character, after this, say if the film was based on a bank robbery, you might see the robbers planning their assault on the bank where they will then go and carry out their plan more often than not accompanied by a fight sequence (usually with guns). After robbing the bank there is normally always a car chase of high speed proportions with guns shots being fired all over the place. I guess it could be said that the film often starts of quietly and builds up to a massive bowl of action.

Certain film producers and directors might use a specific genre such as this because they want to appeal to a certain type of audience. If the film company had already released a few films of other genres over the year, they might feel that they are missing out on a certain proportion of the audience and so they create an action film to tap into the other parts of the media market.

MISS LEA. My Bubble.com is not currently working neither on the school mac or mine at home so i made it text based so you didn't think i was just not bothering to do my homework.  I will transfer this to slideshare ASAP but the Powerpoint thing keeps not responding so i'll do it later.

The 2 Briefs and The Linked Theories.

Brief 1: we can create a promotional package for the release of a music album which would have to include the creation of a promo video to go with 2 other creation options that include:

• A website homepage made for the band/Artist.
• A cover for the release of the DVD.
• A Magazine advertisement for the DVD

Brief 10: Creation of A short film which would last around about 5 minutes, the film can be live action or an animation or even a combination of the both. This will go together with 2 of the following options:

• A poster to accompany the film.
• A radio trailer for the film
• A film magazine review page featuring the film.

Also we must include into our chosen brief of coursework the key, linked theories such as:

• Genre.
• Narrative.
• Representation.
• Audience.
• Media language.