Thursday, 19 September 2013

Textual Analysis 1


 Beyonce- If I were a boy
Written by: BC Jan and Toby Gad
Director: Jake Nava
Genre: Pop
Structure: Narrative.
This music video tells a story through the performance of a narrative. Beyoncé the artist plays the man character of the narrative. Her role is the girlfriend in the relationship between the two characters in the narrative. From the facial expressions and body language it clearly indicates an unhealthy relationship. Trust is the main issue, and suspicions that the male gender is cheating on the female. This is a stereotype as people always assume that the male is the one having the affair. The messages and value coming across from this narrative is expressing and showing that relating to all the female audience that they would like to be a male for the day. Giving the male gender a taste of their own medicine. And shows how they act and how they don’t respect the female.  Stereotypically again showing their careless attitudes towards life and relationships.
The music video has the special effects of being in black and white instead of colour giving the video a sterner and 1950’s feel, making it seem a video from the past not the present which also connects to the narrative as it’s telling the story therefore it’s in black and white because it’s happened before and is a repeated action. Also the colour scheme could represent the differences and dynamics between the gender issues and shows how different the male and female gender are. This has given me an idea for my final product to be in black and white and go for the 50’s era theme.

Using Beyoncé the actual artist as the main character gives the audience more of a personal touch and makes them feel they know more about her and a better understanding as it’s coming from the actual source of the music. Beyoncé portrayers the male gender from the mise-en-scene of the costume, to represent a man’s role. Dressing in a police uniform connotes power and authority, with the cap, sun glasses, shirt, black boots and trousers therefore this clearly states who is the stronger personality and unit in the relationship. Stereotypically in society showing that males are more dominant. However in society a police man appears to be caring, honest and stops, crimes, problems and looks out for people therefore this role contradicts itself.  With this theme and style representing the 50’s this links to then at the views to males overruling females however also indicting that things haven’t changed to the present.
Beyoncé acts very well the body language and mannerisms of the male species plus the careless and selfish attitude towards everyone and everything.  For example the cinematography of the wide shot of Beyoncé not noticing the effort he has put into the breakfast, he was trying to impress her and mid shot shows his emotion and we feel sorry for the man but our feelings are more for Beyoncé as we are seeing her in the alternate role of the male cheat. Beyoncé deals with a criminal and slams him aggressively onto the police car this connotes that men have a violent aspect but makes it enticing to the audience as they are not used to seeing a women acting in this way.  During this action event the use of the low angle medium shot, we can see the other police male co-worker stating voyeurism by closely staring at Beyoncé bottom as she bends over connoting that even though there is a crime taking place the male mind is always voyeuristic. This links to Laura Mulvey (1975) her theory ‘male gaze’.  The cinematography of her bottom is framed left at an extreme close up mostly for the audience’s eyes, so we are forced to look through the male’s point of view.
The medium close up two shot shows Beyoncé using a gun and showing the other male how to control it; this shows the natural flirtatious side of a man and again connecting violence to the male species. The black and grey shooting clothes carries on the colour scheme from the black and white special effects.  It suggests a tempted affair which is reflecting her life experiences, makes the audience feel even more sympathy and empathy towards Beyoncé the artist. ‘Male gaze’ shown again in the scene of the males changing room, a medium close-up of her undressing creating voyeurism. Her costume of a black bra continuing the colour scheme.

Cutting to a master shot shows Beyoncé and her male co-workers, plus her crush. The mise-en-scene of the location is in a warm and comfortable restaurant showing she is having a great time. From the set of the tables and chairs, warm lighting, then the props of salt and pepper is conventional of a restaurant. Use of medium close-ups is used to show Beyoncé and the male revealing their real emotions to the audience. Representing a sneaky male cheat, Beyoncé dances in an inappropriate way since she is supposed to be in a relationship. The medium close up shot shows her shock when she sees her partner is watching ,long two shot shows she tries to explain but as the saying goes 'shes only sorry because she got caught'. Costume is a black dress; again connoting a heartless personality also representing their love has died.

Nearer to the end of the music video, the scene changes to revealing the diegetic sound of the characters conversation. The unforeseen twist is revealed in such clever way , using the diegetic sound of the characters dialogue. Beyoncé “it’s not like I’m sleeping with the guy” (both overlap each other) “what?” leaving a pause this is effective as the use of the camera shows the facial expressions and that’s enough. Then the male partner repeats “I said, it’s not like I’m sleeping with the girl”. From him being the innocent and vulnerable personality the real roles turn back to normal making Beyoncé the protagonist and the male the antagonist. The medium close up shows Beyoncé shed a tear and us as the audience can understand her and feel empathy.


Overall I believe it shows that if a female acted like this it looks far worse and the video shows this therefore it states that as society we stereotypically believe a man would do this, so the female in this role was a shock. Analysing this video gave me sense of a great twist and how the shots, cuts and narrative have been editing to create it. Also matching the lyrics to the narrative gave more of a vocal voice to the story.

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