Sia - Chandelier

This music doesn’t run on a narrative and is more of a conceptual video. What happens in the video could be edited together in anyway and it still look finished and well put together, the way it is pieced together had no effect on the final outcome because it didn’t need to follow a storyline like it would if it was a narrative based music video. This opens to video to a wider range of viewers as not everyone likes to watch music videos with a narrative so to do a conceptual piece appeals to a larger audience.

This music video starts with establishing shots of the three main locations of this music video edited together in a metric montage style, in that each shot of each location lasts for approximately 4 seconds before cutting to the next location. The use of the establishing shots sets the tone and atmosphere of the video as well as showing off the setting of the video without any context; getting the audience to think about what the video is going to be about. With this artist, Sia, their videos are often quite ambiguous leaving the video to be interpreted by individuals who watches it.

The choreography in this music video is cleverly done to synchronise with the beats of the music rather than matching and illustrating the lyrics. This draws the attention to the music instead the lyrics being the focal point of the video, although they play a big part in the song they aren’t the main focus of this particular music video. Using the dancer (Maddie Ziegler)/dancing as the draws the emphasis away from the setting and mise-en-scene and gets the audience to focus on Maddie which in turn means they’re focusing on the music since the choreography is synced with the music.

Long shots are commonly used throughout this music video because it shows off the whole 

body of the dancer and the choreography, which as noted before is the focal point of this video. The use of long shots allows the audience to get a full experience of the setting and the concept. The part of the video when Maddie is sat at the table a mixture of mid-shots and close ups are used because close ups are often used to show the emotion of the shot in an intense manner. In this video the close ups really show the facial expressions of the dancer, and with her being the focus of the music video it shows her off and keeps the focus on her more so than in the long shots where the attention could possibly be adverted to the setting.

 

Maddie Ziegler has become somewhat of a motif in Sia’s music videos since this one, to date she has been five music videos for Sia. When performing Sia never shows her face, she is always wearing a wig that covers the majority of her face, which leads to Maddie being in the videos rather than Sia herself; as well as Maddie wearing a wig similar in all the music videos she stars in. Although Sia is always unseen in her music videos Maddie Ziegler is widely associated with Sia and often when Maddie is seen people think Sia, meaning, though it isn’t direct, the branding/star iconography of Sia’s music videos is very stand out especially as it is different to most other as it is a young, up and coming dancer.