Research:Music video director case study-Spike Jonze

Spike Jonze is an American director, producer, screenwriter and actor, whose work includes music videos, commercials, film and television. Jonze is well known for his music video collaborations with Fatboy Slim, Weezer, Beastie Boys, Björk and Kanye West  but has also directed full length movies such as  Being John Malkovich (1999) ,Adaptation (2002), Where the Wild Things Are (2009) and Her (2013). He also was a co-creator and executive producer of MTV's Jackass.


Music Video's

 He has produced over 50 music videos from 1992 to 2013 including; Praise You - Fatboy Slim and Da Funk - Daft Punk. His breakthrough video for the Beastie Boys song "Sabotage" earned him four MTV Video Music Awards. Throughout the 1990s, he directed music videos and commercials.
Spikes personal factor is making music videos and films that are off-beat with their storytelling, particularly a mix of live action, animation and puppetry. Throughout the 1990s, Jonze directed music videos for many other artists—including R.E.M., the Breeders, Puff Daddy, the Chemical Brothers.

Examples of his work:

Praise you- Fat Boy Slim

Jonze actually starred in this video himself, along with a fictional dance group ‘The Torrance Community Dance Group’. The video was shot guerrilla-style (on location without obtaining permission from the owners of the property) in front of the public outside a movie theatre in Westwood, California. The video mianly features Jonze and the dance group dance to "Praise You", apart from at one point when a theatre employee comes and turns off the stereo.  Norman Cook (Fatboy Slim) is also seen briefly in this video as one of the onlookers. The video apparently cost only $800 to produce, with most of that money going towards a replacement boombox and food for the cast and crew. The video won three major awards at the 1999 MTV Video Music Awards: Breakthrough Video, Best Direction and Best Choreography. It was also nominated for, but did not win, Best Dance Video. It was voted number one of the 100 best videos of all time, in a poll to mark the 20th anniversary of MTV.  

Da Funk – Daft Punk

This video focuses on the character of Charles (Tony Maxwell) who is a dog in a leg cast with a crutch who has lived in New York City for only one month and is shown walking around with a boombox blasting "Da Funk" at a high volume.  Throughout the video the boombox annoys the people he encounters as he is unable to turn it off . At one point Charles meets a woman who he was neighbours with when he was younger and they agree to have dinner together at her home. They decide to go there via the city bus. The woman boards the bus, but Charles is stopped by a sign stating "NO RADIOS". As he is unable to turn off his boombox and is forced to remain at the bus stop. Although the video has drawn several interpretations, Thomas Bangalter (Daft Punk member) has stated: “There's no story. It is just a man-dog walking with a ghetto-blaster in New York. The rest is not meant to say anything. People are trying to explain it: Is it about human tolerance? Integration? Urbanism? There's really no message. There will be a sequel someday.”

Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Da_Funk
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spike_Jonze
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Praise_You

Research: Music Video Regulation

Research:The Male Gaze-Laura Mulvey

The concept of gaze is one that deals with how an audience views the people presented. In this theory it can be seen as how men look at women. The male gaze theory was created by Laura Mulvey who coined the term ‘Male Gaze’ in 1975. She believes that in film audiences have to ‘view’ characters from the perspective of a heterosexual male.

Features of the Male Gaze include:

•  The camera lingering on the curves of the female body 
•  The events which occur to women are presented largely in the context of a man's reaction to these events.
•  Women being reduced to the status of objects.

Other theorists also have noted the sexualizing of the female body ,even in situations where female sexiness, has nothing to do with the product being advertised. Here is an example of an advertisement for Budweiser beer and as you can clearly see there is no clear reason for there to be a woman in this picture but it is there anyway to attract men to look at.

Another example would be the music video for Eric Prydz - Call On Me in which the entire video consists of an aerobics class of women wearing aerobics outfits performing sexually suggestive gym routines which really has no link to the song in the background.

There are some flaws and disagreements with the theory however:

• Some of the women may enjoy the attention and like people to look at them.
• There are videos and media products which use men in the same light, for example in Kelly Rowland’s 'Motivation' some of the men  have less clothes on than she does and she treats them how some women are treated in other music videos-like objects.
• How is the heterosexual male gaze different from the homosexual gaze?
• The gaze can also be directed toward members of the same sex, not all of which are sexual, such as in comparison of body image or in clothing.