Textual Analysis Alt J – Breeze Blocks

Editing The music video is very well edited to the beat of the music and to the lyrics of

the song . The synchronous editing with the beats links to Goodwin’s theory of in terms of thought beats and seeing the sounds and helps to integrate the music into the narrative, allowing the audience to link the lyrics with what they see on screen.

The editing in this music video is very important at illustrating the narrative.  An example of where the lyrics are used to the beat of the song is with the lyric

“La la la", the shots change in time with the music which fits well with the song. The editing used within this music video is the fact that the whole video is in

reverse chronological order and also the slowing down of the music video, apart from that, there are no other effects used within this music video. 

Camera Shots The main shots used within the video are mid shots,

close ups, panning shots and establishing shots.  Establishing shots are used and the very start of the

music video to set the scene. The first shot is quite a shocking one as there is a

mid shot of a girl, who we later find out is one of the main characters of the music video, submerged in water in a blood stained bath tub, showing her obviously dead. We can also see a breeze block placed on top of the body, suggesting to the audience that she has killed, this immediately establishes the narrative of the music video. This shot in is almost synchronised to match the connotations of the first line of the song being “she may contain the urge to run away, but hold her down with soggy clothes and breezeblocks”. Evidently, the audience are able to make the link that the “she”/”her” is the woman in the bath and that she had intentions of running away. From what the audience can see in the shot, they may make the establishment that this is an act of violence in an abusive relationship and this is aided as arguably it includes Propp’s characters of the villain and the princess.

Camera Shots It then switches to another character, a male,

who is seen through a close up shot. In this shot we can clearly see this character showing emotion as he has his head in his hands. It then proceeds to an extreme close up of a wedding ring on his finger, this helps to put emphasis on the ring and suggest to the audience that it is key to the narrative. Later on there is then the same shot of the wedding ring which then cuts to the woman who looks to be held hostage, with a wedding ring on. This gives the audience the impression that these two are in fact married.

There is a series of cross cuts between a close up of the two fighting over the breezeblock and their feet moving back and forth. This helped to identify that there is indeed a power struggle between two opposites however the close up makes it unrevealing.

Camera Shots Another shot used would be

a over the shoulder shot, this is used when the throwing of the bottle, we can see that the woman is throwing a bottle at the man from this shot.

Low angle medium shot of the woman sneaking out of the door in slow motion, which gives the whole concept a creepy feel. 

Mise-En Scene The clothing between both of the two main characters

are wearing both dark toned clothing. The lighting used within the music video is very dark and

looks that only natural lighting is used throughout the whole video, it also gives the video a unhappy feel, however the lighting does tend to become lighter on an object which is obviously done to highlight its importance. The low key lighting sets a silhouette of the man coming through the door and makes it seem almost like a horror film but also takes away the identity of the man.

The location of the video looks as though it is in a modern household, which could suggest they are trying to reach out to more of an modern audience. Also, the house is seen to be quite plain with no bright colours standing out, focusing all the attention of the video of the main characters involved.