Music Video Evaluation

Music Video Evaluation
Stand By Me is rhythm and blues by Ben E. King. The song was released in April 1961, and the song label is Atco. The music video is a conventional narrative video as it portrays a teenage couple’s romance, appealing to the target audience of mainstreamers between 13-25 of both genders.
The video starts off by the couple sitting in a cafe arguing with cacophonous and disharmonic diegetic background noise. Both of the characters are wearing dull-coloured grey and black clothes, as well as being edited black and white with increased shadows and darkness, creating an ominous atmosphere. Grey is a neutral colour that is often associated with apathy and disinterest, reflecting on the characters’ emotions. The male character leaves the cafe, the female character being left behind by herself. This scene makes the video rather mainstream as most videos convey postfeminism, characterising women to be “passive” to appeal to audience. Unlike other mainstream music videos, this video does not necessarily convey sexualisation or sex appeal to attract audience, therefore not supporting Mulvey’s male gaze. Hence, we can infer from the video that the couple’s relationship is a healthy and not lust-based, where

As my focus group triangulation stated that my target audience find symbolism-rich narrative videos more appealing and intriguing rather than abstract or performance based videos, I believe that this video can be capable of keeping my target audience attracted. The audience also stated that good cinematography, editing, and narrative make the music video interesting. Since this video consists of various shot types and editing with the beat, I believe that I have done a decent job. However, in order to further meet the needs of our audience, I will ensure that the footages are not shaky, possibly by using a stabiliser, and that we obtain more footage and cuts to keep the audience more