MS: Auteur Analysis

Red Hot Chili Peppers – Dani California. (Tony Kaye, 2006)

This song is mise-en-scene based as each verse and chorus changes between genres and era’s of music and costume. It does not follow the lyrics of the song. In the first scene set in the 50’s the band portrays Elvis Presley.

The camera is set to a grainy black and white and has the full band in one image with a slow zoom in. The next scene is of the band portraying the Beatles, all again in 60’s costume with cuts to each band member playing in their vintage costume and guitars.

The next scenes depict Frank Zappa, David Bowie and a 70’s Disco interpretation, before cutting to a Sex Pistols interpretation which is shot with fast camera cutting rate, jolted handicap recordings and exotic angles.

The chorus finishes with a death metal band portraying minimal movement from the whole band before gently segueing into a Def Leppard style band with flashing colours, interesting leopard and velvet costumes and make-up.

It takes a modern approach and covers Nirvana’s acoustic set in New York and a take on Green Day too. They finish the video as themselves and how they perform live.



Here is a picture showing the 9 genres and artists.

Feeder – Feeling the Moment. (Odell, 2005)

This song uses plenty of slow motion, reversed scenes and projected images. It depicts a performance based video with some small storyline to justify certain lyrics, the band is seen in full with occasional glances at the hands of the guitars and drummer to show them playing and to exhibit their musical talent.

David Bowie – Heroes. (Visconti, 1977)
This song uses a few shots of Bowie singing the whole song, few angles change, only a zoom in and out, in a dark backdrop with gentle lighting. It shows how Bowie alone can still create a powerful song, by showing the emotional facial expressions and body language.

Kings of Leon – The Bucket. (Johns & Petraglia, 2004)

This song uses multiple cameras to show both the whole band and individual members performing the song. Some shots have 4 screens others have 16, almost like the television series “24” when the split screen images are used.

Placebo – Meds. (Tikivoi, 2006)

This music video shows the viewers the effects that singer Brian Molko is experiencing from taking drugs. The use of photoshop is common throughout to show psychedelic and druggy effects. The camera angles are very unique as there is a camera that is viewing Molko is a close up us whiles he walks around different places, making his head steady in the frame whilst the world revolves around him. The furnature talks to him and people have distorted faces and bodies aswell as extra limbs.

Green Day – Walking Contradiction. (Coppola, 1996)

This song reflects how things go wrong and, or contradict themselves. Written after poor conditions of living, drug abuse and insomnia from the birth of his first son, Billie Joe the lead singer writes about how everything is going wrong. This is reflected in the music video by the band acting as the 3 main characters, as disasters occur all around them whilst they are oblivious. The lyrics partially relate to the music video as certain words or phrases turn into phrases.

The Flaming Lips – Yeah Yeah Yeah Song. (Coyne, 2006)

This song has strongly political lyrics and refers to how people have such high demands for certain products and consume items of food that are unhealthy and a drain on the nations resources, as well as those living on benefits and those in control of parliament and governments. This is shown in the video by having people be covered with food and sent out to greedy fat men, American police officers (known for drinking a lot of coffee and eating doughnuts) and finally a werewolf who is depicted as being society and the law. The video is almost entirely satirical and makes fun of the political situation.

The mise-en-scene of this video is also a key part as it looks as though it could be in a concentration camp, a middle-eastern town or an american prison. There are many exiting montages in this video that show torture by asian women with fast food, the lead singer acting as a dictator, chase scenes and how the world just flies by in the process. Long shots, close-up and canted angles are frequenct in the chase scenes. There are many changes in lighting which will capture the audience effectively; shots such as the dark chamber with asian women will instantly flash to a hot sunny Arabian day in the middle of a town, and back again.