Cry Me a River – Julie London

Music Video- Cool Jazz

3 minutes estimated in length

A Level Media Studies Paige Aitken and Lucy Whitehead

Stylistic InfluencesOur style to our video is going to be very old fashioned, with the 1950’s look. Our influences are from Julie London and the dress

style from the 1950’s when the song was made. We can also look at old fashioned videos such as Billie Holiday. Also, we can look at films such as Marilyn Monroe because of the black and white camera angles and shots; we can see what works well.

She is also very iconic for that period of time. Modern day singer Florence and the Machine has a vintage style and her Rabbit

Heart music video is an influence as it creates a dreamy, floating mood by using sunlight through the camera shot. Also,

the dancers and performers are happy, and there is a small amount of lip synching; we do not want too much in our

production. In Amy Winehouse’s rehab video, we like the use of the alcohol and smoking as part of the break up part of the

video.

Intended Audience The video is aimed towards teenagers, aged 16-19 as we are going

to use teenage actors to perform in our video. Although the song is from the 1950’s, and many teenagers would not of heard of, we

want to use this song as it is an unique and unusual idea as well as there being no music video ever made for this song by Julie London. Below are examples of what our intended audience already watch.

The Visual Style We are going to use the black and white effect when editing and

we are not going to use a lot of technical transitions as we do not want our music video to seem modern- we want to make sure

our video looks old-fashioned and from the 1950’s. We are going to use slow tracking shots to give the effect of relaxed and

dream-like. With the use of high angle shots and close ups on the characters, this will give the effect to the audience that it is

intimate and loving. Examples of this, would be Florence and The Machines Rabbit Heart where the shots are dream-like and

blurry. On the other storyline that is running through the video, the female will be depressed and the audience will see images of her drinking, smoking, and taking drugs and preparing to kill her husband/her herself. Examples of these shots are like Amy

Winehouse, Rebab. The images to the left show the transitions

and the dress style, with umbrellas, and long feminine dresses.

Rabbit Heart: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nxO-

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The Sound Style

Our music is Julie London- Cry Me A River

The music is of the genre – Cool Jazz

Click on the soundtrack

Julie London-Cry Me A River.mp3

Mise en Scene Our location is going to be in The Meads, which is a field; this is ideal for the 1st

storyline as it is a romantic setting and we have ideas of the couple sitting in the long grasses. Also, we are going to use an inside location of a

bathroom, and garden to show the second storyline. We need to use one shot of a graveyard at the end of our production.

For the costumes of our performers we are going to use on the female a 1950’s styled dress, and a head piece. For the second storyline we are going to a wedding dress to show contrast of how she is heartbroken. For the male

performer, he is going to be seen in an old styled- suit with a top hat. He will have old fashioned hair.

The Narrative Structure

There are two storylines throughout the video. The first is a couple in love; the audience see shots of the couple happy, outside together,

“old fashioned love” e.g. long walks in fields, sitting on benches, under trees on a sunny morning… etc. The second storyline is the female who is depressed through being heartbroken. The audience see shots of her preparing to kill her husband- so it seems but the end shot will be her ex-husband laying flowers at a gravestone- meaning that she has killed herself. This make this makes the

audience think. These two storylines contrast as you see them in love, then the consequences of love through heartbreak. The

storyline is narrative, yet the couple in love are flashbacks but we are going to use the same effects, so the audience have to work out

the storyline then be tricked at the end.

Team Roles

Paige Aitken will be focusing on the camerawork of the production, by using different angles and shots shown by our storyboard.

Lucy Whitehead will be directing and prompting the performers and using the storyboard. Also, directing the costumes and using the music to make sure

each shot is correct.

Daniella Cox will be playing the part of the female in love and also playing the part of the female with her heart broken, then we see that she dies at the

end.

Jack Risley will be playing the part of the male in love and also playing the part of the couple rowing, we then see him walking up to her grave stone.

Ancillary Task 1

Digipack – Photos of Julie London, Background information about her, all her songs and when they were released,

Lyrics of the song ‘Cry me a river’ with photos of Daniella and Jack in the background. We want it to look old

fashioned therefore we can put the photo’s in black and white. The digipack is a memoir of her music.

Ancillary Task 2Magazine advertisement – We have

to consider which magazine we are going to advertise in as we need to get the attention of our target audience. Therefore as

our target audience is for teenagers age between 16-19 we would choose magazines

such as Elle, Glamour and GQ. The advertisement will near to

music review pages. We have to think about the stylistic features of our production to fit in with our

advertisement e.g. 1950’s fashion.

Conclusion

The Unique Selling Point of our production is that we are going to produce a music video to a teenage audience, using a very old

song. This is unique and hasn’t been done before. Also, our ideas are creative because there is no video for this song. It is going to

demonstrate our skills by using flashbacks, and two storylines through the video. Also, we are going to use effects in editing and

use a range of camera shots to show the romance and heartbreak. We want to use lighting to create a dreamy, romantic effect in the 1st storyline. We are going to use of editing skills because we have two

storylines to cut and edit into each other as well as overlapping images.