Wednesday, 4 November 2009

Music Video Analysis - Florence and The Machine - Kiss with a Fist - Use of Minimalism and Surrealism


The entirety of Florence and the Machines video, Kiss with a Fist is filmed in an empty white room with few props. Of the props used there is a heart shaped wreath of summer flowers, a bed made to look like its on fire a white box and different coloured hanging decorations. Other than these, the video focuses almost entirely on Florence Welch in colourful child-like clothing as she plays up to the camera.
The use of shooting the video in this way is that it guides the audiences focus to the main character and to listen more carefully to the lyrics without being distracted by any background features or locations. This way the audience clearly understands that the video is a linear narrative reflecting the action in the song, this is made even cleared due to the emphasis created by the symbolized bed on fire alongside the lyric ‘I set fire to our bed’.
The video opens with an extreme close up of Welch’s eyes surrounded by a soft black border, this is the only extreme close up in the entire video which is unusual since a common convention in music videos is the general use of extreme close ups. Her ‘bedroom’ eyes are used to stun the audience and draw in especially the male audience; it’s a way of capturing the audience’s attention and hooking them. It quickly cuts to a medium close up of her head surrounded by the heart shaped wreath, this fills up the entire frame with appealing summer colours which also attracts the viewers eye. It suddenly cuts to a medium shot of her in the centre third of the frame with nothing else except the white background. She contrasts strongly against the background reflecting her as a colourful character. Over the next 6 shots she dances playfully and child-like, never taking her intense eyes off the camera. Through this technique the audience are pulled in to the narrative being treated as the person she is describing in the song, ultimately becoming personally involved in the story.
The following medium long shot introduces the bed with the wreath hanging above it alongside the lyric ‘I set fire to your bed’, here Welch is laying on the bed and at this point it is not ‘on fire’ but it cuts quickly to a medium shot of her holding the wreath again and quickly cuts back to her hopping off the bed as it begins to catch fire. This technique is used to create ellipsis so only the vital action is shown; the audience can fill in the gap without any form of violence being shown. This technique is used again straight after as it cuts away from and back to the bed where it is suddenly completely on fire. The fire is symbolised using clear coloured plastic sheets blown up by a wind machine. This represents the death of love that she is talking about in the song, especially as the heart shaped wreath is at the top of the bed which would eventually be destroyed, on the other hand this could also represent the passion in the relationship and the fire in the violent fight she is describing.
Another way in which the violence has been symbolised is through Welch aggressively attacking these hanging ornaments with a stick, the ornaments of which are also red further connoting fire and passion. Later on in the video she attacks the same ornaments but they are blue, this could represent the male character as blue is linked with a boy when a baby is born; also the male character in the video is wearing a blue t-shirt so it could link to him, futhermore the stick she is using has a baby pink bow tied around it which reflects the female element.
There are some strong references to Alice in Wonderland in this video through the use of costume (her striped knee length socks), the use of low angle shots (making Welch appear as though she is shrinking(1.40)), the use of quick zoom (to make it look as though she is shrinking(0:43)), canted angles to create confusion (much like a dream or nightmare(1:20)), and the surreal shot of her in a long shot on the left third of the shot a close up of her legs running away in the right third of the shot(1:45). The reference to Alice in Wonderland is most probably the inspiration for the surrealist video as the story itself is very surrealist.

No comments:

Post a Comment