Music video Evaluation - The Lumineers 'Cleopatra'

1. Music Video Evaluation - The Lumineers ‘Cleopatra’
The music video ‘Cleopatra’ by The Lumineers was directed by Isaac Ravishankara. It is a Narrative music
video. The video begins with atmospheric sounds and a shot of a women walking
and getting into the drivers seat of a taxi. The noise of cars in the distance gives a
very isolated and quiet feeling. The clip was shot in square, like in old films etc
that were filmed on old film cameras. This would have been purposely constructed
to give the video its own style, it could have either been filmed on a film camera
or it could have been made to look like this in editing during post production.
From this first shot we as an audience can guess that this women is going to be the
main character that we follow her story in the video. We can straight away say
that this is going to be a narrative video as the first shot creates many questions.
We then see a pregnant women appear who asks if she can get in the taxi, the old
women agrees. As the song begins we see various angled close up shots of her
face, she almost looks upset, we then have a close up shot of the pregnant women
then go back to other close up of the driver, she then smiles. From this the
audience can assume that she is either very lonely and likes company or is happy
to help people who need it. When she smiles the screen widens from a square to
fill the screen, this is also done to the beat of the music.
We then see an over the shoulder shot and
can see a picture of a young boy, we assume
as the audience that this is a relative. the
director did this to make us feel personally
connected to to the women.

2. A lot of two shots are used to show the relationship between the people
that get in the taxi. Even though the band don’t perform in the video the
have developed their own iconography. I looked at four of their music
videos and they all shared vey similar qualities. Firstly all the videos start
in a square screen and slowly fill the screen out either when someone
smiles or when the beat of the music picks up. ‘The Lumineers’ often use
intertextual references to their other videos. For example in this video
there are the main characters from three of their other videos. Something
else they include in all their videos is a very significant part of all the
videos. They include a shot of the main character almost splitting into two
people, one version of them makes the right decision and the other
makes the wrong. I think this feature works really well as it almost adds
an additional narrative to the video because you see how the two lives
turn out. Finally in every video that they don't perform in they will be
somewhere in the video not performing just another character.
This shot suggests that the main
character shows her happiness
when other people are happy.
This specific shot easily shows the
separation between the driver and
the passengers and how they are
in their own world in the back and
not interacting with the driver.

3. A lot of close up shots are used to show the emotion
on peoples faces more clearly. In between seeing
close ups of all the other people we always go back
to looking at what the drivers emotions are. Almost
like she is reacting to looking at her passengers
emotions. We see all the people sat in the same seat
of the taxi looking out the window to show the
amount of passengers she as a driver sees and even
though they all do the same things they are all
different and have different stories and backgrounds.
Eyeline match was used when the drivers passengers
got out we saw her change and her face seemed
upset again but then she saw something an smiled,
eye line match was used and we saw she was smiling
at a women. These two shots were purposely
constructed to look very similar, so you easily notice
the main difference, age. This scene is significant
because they both look and smile like they know each
other but we never find out as an audience which
could suggest she’s could know many people from
giving them rides, as she has seen many stories.
The action and change of scene is edited to the tempo
or beat of the song, which creates a smooth flow from
scene to scene, which could reflect her work, and how
she goes from passenger to passenger quickly.

4. An over the shoulder shot is used to show the audience her point of view. The mood of video picks up as the
passenger this time sits in the front seat instead of in the back. A pull focus is used and we can then see that he
is the boy from the photo at the beginning of the video. A close up shot of them hugging is then used to show
the relationship between them. From their emotions and body language we can assume that they are mother
and son. Another over the shoulder shot is used to show his perspective and we are once again shown personal
pictures from inside her taxi, which makes us as an audience feel more connected to them as characters.
This two shot is used to show the relationship
between who we assume are mother and
son. This shot is significant because taxi
drivers never have passengers in the front
seat which is why we quickly assume they
very close.
This long shot was used to show the change in location
and who is in the scene. The director would have
purposely filmed this shot at this time to achieve the
beautiful colour in the sky, as it suites the overall colour
scheme of the video and creates a calming relaxed
mood.

5. Close up shots are edited next to each other to
show change in emotion when the
time they spent
together comes
to and end, this
once again
shows the close
relationship they
share.
A long shot is once again used to show
change in location. The characters are
seen hugging outside of a house. The
taxi is next to them but the red car
lights still on suggest that she is not
staying. A closer shot of them hugging
is shown so we feel closer to them
which builds the emotion and effect
on the audience.
This is when we see the characters body split and we have an over the
shoulder shot of her watching her other person walking inside, her
emotion suggests that she regrets not going inside
The last shot in the video is of her driving away in
the taxi, her facial expression suggests she is
regretting not choosing the right thing to do and
going inside. On the last note in the song the taxi
light turns on suggesting she is going back on duty
and her life carries on the same loop watching
peoples stories from the drivers seat, this is finally
suggested because the screen goes back to a
square like at the start of the video.