G324 - Student Music Video Analysis: Rudimental ft Ella Eyre - Waiting All Night

The video created appears to be well fitted to the combination of Ella Eyre's R&B style with Rudimental's Drum and Base genre. This is achieved through the editing effects and being cut on beat as well as through the relatively simplistic narrative as well as the sexual representation of the female protagonist which is conventional for R&B videos. The typical narrative for R&B videos centres around some form of relationship with another which is clearly depicted within the narrative of this student video.

The storyline of the video follows a female protagonist who is repeatedly being stood up by her boyfriend. The video begins with the protagonist setting up for a picnic before receiving a text from her partner, telling her that he cannot make it. The video goes on to depict the female protagonist going out with her friend, seemingly in an attempt to forget about her boyfriend standing her up, before then showing a montage of clips which combines multiple situations in which the girl has been stood up by her partner. Towards the end of the video, the protagonist catches her boyfriend cheating on her with her best friend, causing the two to break up. The video ends with the protagonist deleting her boyfriends number, symbolising the end to their relationship.

The close-ups of the protagonist are expected within video due to this being a common theme of R&B videos, as well as the sexualisation of the female protagonist. This indicates that the students who made the video had a firm understanding of the conventions for their music video genre as the encompassed them so well. The theme of the video appears to be independence and betrayal, shown through the simple narrative of the boyfriend betraying the protagonist and the protagonist gaining independence through dumping him. By basing the narrative around the lyrics and incorporating them into the video, it allows for them to be clearly reflected within the narrative which helps to create a story.

The narrative within the music video is strengthened by the way in which it incorporates Todorov's narrative theory and structure. There is a clear equilibrium established at the beginning and the end of the video with the protagonist being shown on her own, with an evident disruption of the partners lack of communication, recognition of his adulterous actions and the protagonist's resolution of breaking with him within the video. This is further enhanced by the battle of wits between two important recognisable character's from Propp's character theory; the hero (the protagonist) and the villain (the boyfriend).

The video looks at representation of gender in both a non-stereotypical way and a stereotypical way. It stereotypically presents males as being dominant and untrustworthy, as well as showing the female protagonist to be stereotypically emotional. However, it also shows the protagonist to be non-stereotypically powerful through her finding the courage to break up with her boyfriend. This allows for a wider target audience as more people are able to relate to the situation. It appears, therefore, that the target audience for this music video would be middle class females between the ages of 13 and 30, most probably also white.

The video is set in a many locations, including a field, a theme park and multiple restaurants. The use of the empty field at the beginning of the video was significant as it connoted the loneliness of the protagonist and exemplified her abandonment. The theme park helps to connote the protagonist's attempts at forgetting by replacing sadness with excitement. In addition, the use of multiple restaurants connotes the multitude of times that the protagonist has been left, whilst also adding to the relatability of the video.

 

The editing of the video is on beat, showing the careful consideration the students must have put into the process. There are a variety of transitions used between scenes which have a relatively good affect on the video, however could arguably be a bit excessive at times. Despite this, some of the editing effects used such as the overlays and the video-in-video aspects do add a sense of professionalism to the overall video. Unfortunately, whilst the lip sync of the video is well edited, the performance of the actress is not good enough for it to appear realistic and the audience is left with a shattered sense of realism. This therefore lowers the overall quality of the video as it's no longer believable that the protagonist is the one singing.

Completing this analysis will help me when it comes to creating my own music video as it has allowed me to understand even more about the importance of the lip sync as well as indicating that the narrative of the video needs to be it's strongest point.