Music Video 15 mark essay

“Music videos reflect the social and cultural context in which they were made” 

Discuss this statement through a comparison of the two music videos you have studied. One mv from list A (CBR) and one from list B (DG)

In Stop Where You Are the social aspects of the video are mental health, class and judging people. This is shown in the video by focusing on the people being represented, such as a stereotypical teenage girl, a man with tattoos and a homeless woman. CBR is playing a motivational person in the video, as she is trying to convey her message of being in the present and celebrating what is happening right in this very moment.

The people being represented in CBR’s video are all on the fringes of society and tend to get judged by the majority of people. This is similar to Titanium as the boy is presented as someone who is alone and gets judged for who he is.

In Stop Where You Are, the first shot is of a teenage girl wearing a hoodie. We cannot see her face as she is turned away, and it is a long shot wide angle with her framed to the side, with the rest of the environment taking up the shot. We can gather from this that she is overlooked by society and no one really cares for her, which could be down to her Asian ethnicity. There is then a cut to a closer up frame of her, and she has now turned around so we can see her face. By doing this, CBR is saying do not judge people straight away, as they might be vulnerable, no matter what they look like.

There is a similar theme In Titanium, with a young boy being shown as a threat, with society jumping to conclusions and being scared of him and judging him because of his powers instead of helping him, as he is also scared and confused with what he has done. This is shown straight away in the video with him slowly getting up off the floor looking confused, and we see a teacher on the phone calling for help, and as she sees him, she slams the door and looks very scared. The video is in slow motion for this section and there is a close up on the teacher’s face so we can see what she is saying. Throughout the video, we see more of how the boy lives and what he thinks about the situation. We see that he is very confused and scared with what he has done, and he is running away from the police who are trying to capture him. This is showing how straight away society have judged him and his powers negatively, instead of trying to find the positives and help him, as he is also scared of what he can do.

Overall, CBR and Titanium have both conveyed similar messages of not judging people negatively straight away, and instead find out more about them and their situation, because they might be how they are for a reason, and that may lead to them needing help with it rather than being put down being alienated by society. However, in Titanium we don’t see the boy having a good moment where he stops being pressured and judged, so this is more extreme, as it is showing only what society is like, whereas CBR is also showing what society should be like, as each person in the video is redeemed later on, as they start getting the necessary treatment and attention by people.