Beyonces track...'Ring the alarm' was on her album b'day and was recieved with mixed reception. The narrative for the video is Beyonce playing a women who is feeling threatened after her husband is cheating on her. The lyrics 'ring the alarm' clearly state a scared and angry women who is feeling threatened by th other women taking everything she owns and profits...."She gon' take everything I own, If I let you go, I can't let you goDamn, if I let you go".
The video is quite different to Beyonces previous videos as the tone of the song is more angry, i think this could slightly challange the typical RnB steretyped music that is presented today.
The fisrt shot we see of Beyonce is a close up of her face, she appears to not be wearing much make-up and be lying down across a table. There is a red light cast all over her, that could be connoting danger...love or anger, all of these emotions would link with the narrative and title of the song. the immediate close-up shot helps establish her character and helps us connect with beyonce too.
Her costume at the beginning of the music video is just a plain, what looks like a white males shirt, the white can suggest connotations of vulnerability, innoscence and pureness, these connotation co-ordinate well with the emotions that are trying to be put across as Beyonce being the victim and her cheating husband being the villain (similar to propps theory).
There is a siren that is used throughout the music video at different times, this acts as a background sound, it reinforces the meaning of the song and the siren adds to the theme of 'ring the alarm' to alert beyonce of what her cheating husband is doing.
Beyonce is in several costumes, another is where she is in a crochet crop top and cut off jeans, this look is very realistic; reinforcing the realism of the situation. In this costume beyonce is set at home overlooking a beach, the waves are visciously coming up to the shore connecting with the angry tone being demonstrated. Beyonce has hardly any make-up on and her hair is sort of messy, this also reinforces the realism of being a home and her looking natural.
The next cotume is a white top, pencil skirt and long jacket her character now looks dominant and the white again represents innoscence that she has not done anything wrong. In this setting beyonce looks asif she is in an office of some kind....trying to sort out what is hers from her marriage and trying to make sure the other woman dosent get anything, there are men around her restraining her from the anger she is feeling, this portrays men and women as strong and dominant in this scene.. Her hair is nicely curled and put up, reinforcing her gender as a female and almost challanging dominant gender as she looks asif she is very much in controle, this is similar to a lot of female RnB artists videos, they portray women as strong, dominant and in controle people.
The majority of camera shots used are close-ups and medium shots, these are showing what is going on in each scene and are genrally used in most RnB videos to allow the veiwers to connect with the characters emotions (in this case anger) and it makes the video seem more realistic.
The last part of the video see's Beyonce putting on red lipstick, we get an extreme close-up of her lips which connote sensuality and sexiness. The red also used in the beginning of the video to connote danger could now be construded as Beyonces character gaining controle and now flauting her sexiness and senualness infront of her old lover as the red lipstick connotes love...mystery...danger...and also sensual feelings.
The lighting used in the video is mainly spot lights on Beyonce especially in the scene where she is getting interogted, the use of spotlights higlight her face so we can clearly see her expression. There is also a red light being projecting onto beyonce in some of the scenes, the red light can signify the siren going off and also connote a feeling of danger.
Throughout the majority of the video Beyonce is dancing, this reinforces the RnB genre as in almost every RnB video, especially females dancing is always included.
The editing used is fast paced and swithced between the different scenes to connect the whole video together. The fast pace editing connects well with the fast pace of the song and also reinforces her angry emotions but the quick flicking between each shot.
Beyonces movement and gestures also match the songs ton of anger and desperation, all RnB music videos try and match there dance style and actions to the theme of the song...if the song was about love the dance and movements would be more softer...is the song was about a male or female the movements and dancing would be more sexy to co-ordinate with the music. As for 'ring the alarm' the movements from Beyonce are very harsh and striking due to the angry emotions, her dancing is also more free and contains bigger more drastic moves, they too coenside with the tone of the song.
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