The relationship between visuals and lyrics:
In the music video for thriller there is a direct connection between the lyrics and visuals, it is a mix between a concept video and performance, it tends to switch between the two. The visuals and lyrics do link directly for example 'Its close to midnight, and something evils lurking in the dark' as this lyric is sung the visuals match it because it is at nigh and the scene looks very spooky. All together the visuals and lyrics constantly link together which means the audience can understand what is going on in the video easily and can follow the story without struggling.
Intertextuality:
There isn't a huge amount of intertextuality in this music video but it does link to the cinema, film and horror films. The video switches from a movie to then the audience watching people watch a movie. It links to film culture and horror films, the music video shows a snippet of a horror film which the main characters are watching at the start of the video. This is referencing the horror film culture.
Performance:
In this music video there is a mix of performance and concept and it switches between the two throughout the video, because the video is not just music and a lot of it is concept there is about an equal balance between the two. The performance part of the video is very good, the artist is portrayed as the main character and the lead role, the whole performance is around him. It is a lot different from a common performance meanig there is no band just normally playing. The performance is linked into the concept and is threaded through instead of the performance section being a completely different shot and scene eg the woman is being chased by zombies in the story but then they change to the zombies dancing.
Part of the Story (Being chased by zombies)
Performance ( Zombies dancing)
There is a lot of dancing done in this music video, the dancing is done very well and instead of it just being normal dancing, it is done in a very unique way with a specialized dance which became iconic. During the performance there are many shot types used for example wise shots, long shots and close up shots. The dancing was very organised and choreographed well and clearly had a lot of time spent into making it perfect.
Narrative:
There is a clear narrative in this music video, the director clearly wanted to make the narrative easy to follow so the audience didn't struggle when watching and just enjoyed, this is why they included the start and last bit to add more of a story and make the video not just the music. There is narrative closure and the story ends meaning the audience have closure on the plot.
Mode of address/Star treatment:
There are moments in the music video when characters look into the camera, this doesn't seem to be done to address the audience or tell them anything, it is simply just done for the effect. At the end of the video there is an iconic stand out point when the main character turns their head and looks straight into the camera, this creates an effect of cliffhanger because it makes the audience ask more questions and think more about the story of the video. There is a clear use of star treatment used in the thriller video. The star is singled out very obviously and it is made obvious to the audience who the main character is. This is done by the editing, there are mainly more shots which include the main character then the other character and the shots keep returning to Michael to make the audience understand who is the most important to follow.
Example of mode of address
Pace:
The pace of the video is more or less the same speed throughout the majority of the video. Each shot usually has the same amount of time on screen, there aren't any really long shots or really quick shots until the chorus of the song. At some points in the chorus there is a change in pace and it it speeds up with faster shot changes and more shot variety.
Shot Variety:
There is a lot of shot variety used in this music video, every shot type is used more than once, in just the opening minute most of the different shot types are used. Below are some examples of the different shot types used.
Close Up
Medium Close Up
Close Up
Extreme Close Up
Wide Shot
Long Shot
Extreme Wide/Long Shot
Mise-en-scene/location:
The mise-en-scene and location was clearly very carefully though about when making this music video and it is also very important, if it was not done correctly the director wouldn't have been able to create the same spooky effect and impact the audience as much as it did.
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