song: ‘Teen Idle’ (2012, Atlantic Records)
Artist: Marina and the Diamonds
directed, shot & edited by Mihai tiu
Artist: Marina and the Diamonds
directed, shot & edited by Mihai tiu
Included on the album Electra Heart (2012), the song focuses on themes such as death, fame, sin, addiction, trauma, the condition of women in society, the desire for perfection and the illusion of physical beauty. These concepts have continued to remain relevant and the way Marina explores them lyrically determined me to adapt them visually in the music video I made in 2018, at the end of the second semester of the first year of College, under the guidance of Professor Dan Curean.
The video opens with an underwater scene, in which the protagonist has the appearance of a mermaid contemplating existence, on the ocean floor. Trying to follow as closely as possible the message behind the lyrics, I decided it was appropriate to translate the image of the young woman who ironically manifests her vision of an adolescence she did not live, in the form of a mermaid who will not have to face the traumas of contemporary society ever. The sarcastic desires that take the form of pseudo-regrets are illustrated by the lyrics 'I wanna be a bottle blonde, I don't know why but I feel conned,/ I wanna be an idle teen' at the beginning of the song. The image of the mermaid attached to these lyrics has to be correlated with the following frame through a connection on graphic elements, in which the mermaid appears in an art-deco interior, in the form of a girl seen naked in a semi-contre-jour among empty wine bottles and open books.
The lyrics 'I wanna stay inside all day, I want the world to go away / [...] I wanna be a real fake' are juxtaposed with a montage in which we see the young woman full of so-called regrets, putting on her makeup similar to the Hollywood movie stars of the '50s. The critique of the way society treats women is visually translated with beauty-grotesque antitheses, just as the song adjoins contradictory feelings through puns or the ironic nature of the lyrics. Even in the title of the song, the artist decided to replace the word idol with idle, which even if pronounced the same, gives a completely different nuance to the message. The teen idol specific to the western culture of the '80s, is now replaced by the "indolent teenager" (teen idle), and Marina rhymes these phrases with the word suicidal, once again pointing out the critical way in which she relates to society. Next, I chose to bring to the chorus a visual support that would intrigue and shock at the same time. The lion lying on the floor next to the protagonist of the video, in an intentionally hyper-dramatized setting, reminds of the danger and temptations of the world, where luxury, sublime and fame endanger the integrity, well-being or even the life of those who want them.
Almost theatrically, this setting is followed by a black and white flashback, where the protagonist seems to enjoy life in the company of another girl, who got lost on the way looking for the Prom Queen title.
In the following frames, the protagonist is seen touching her abdominal area, as if she were carrying a fetus in her womb, while reciting the lyrics 'I wanna be a virgin pure'. Then, on a bed with white bedding, the image of the woman is now associated with that of Marilyn Monroe, a reference that I tried to emphasize using similar makeup and hair, on a mise-en-scene inspired by Milton Greene's photos of Marilyn . The lyrics that adhere to these frames are: 'A 21st century whore / I want back my virginity / So I can feel infinity'. Even though Marilyn was part of the previous century, her legend still goes on. The red and purple frames, in which the young woman in the video crashes the grapes on her groin area, refer to the way in which female eroticism has been fetishized throughout history. By simulating masturbation, these images are intended to open a conversation among a potential audience, raising the issue of worshiping the female body as an entity intended for male pleasure, excluding the purpose of satisfying themselves.
Also, the frames in which the corpse of the girl who no longer wanted to face society and a culture full of preconceptions is bathed in camera flashes, overlap the lyrics 'super, super, super suicidal/ [...] Adolescence didn't make sense, A little loss of innocence'. The protagonist of the video gradually loses her individuality in favor of acquiring a universal one. Suicide among teenagers is a big issue of our society, and the fact that Marina And the Diamonds is campaigning for these causes has once again led me to approach this project.
The mermaid, whose image is seen throughout the video in short close-ups, is an alter ego of the young woman and her very presence works, in my opinion, as an irony to the way society treats women - we do not share the same concepts with a mermaid, whose power of seduction brings death. We can feel attraction or hatred towards a mermaid, but never understanding and compassion.
The image of Venus in Botticelli's masterpiece is glimpsed among tar drips, suggesting that beauty is ephemeral, that exoticism brought to women is an outdated concept that must be left in the Renaissance, and that regardless of gender, we are all destined to a common end.
I chose to use the 4: 3 aspect ratio in this audio-visual product, due to the claustrophobic to simulate a nostalgic image, evoking the atmosphere of domestic films recorded on Super 8 formats in the '70s, but also to simulate the aesthetic of the Hollywood glamour of the '50s. In terms of visual effects, in addition to some scenes in which I used matte painting and 3D compositing, most interventions consisted of color grading, post-production damage, such as the addition of chromatic aberrations, the use of flares for cuts, or overlays with dust and scratches.
The video opens with an underwater scene, in which the protagonist has the appearance of a mermaid contemplating existence, on the ocean floor. Trying to follow as closely as possible the message behind the lyrics, I decided it was appropriate to translate the image of the young woman who ironically manifests her vision of an adolescence she did not live, in the form of a mermaid who will not have to face the traumas of contemporary society ever. The sarcastic desires that take the form of pseudo-regrets are illustrated by the lyrics 'I wanna be a bottle blonde, I don't know why but I feel conned,/ I wanna be an idle teen' at the beginning of the song. The image of the mermaid attached to these lyrics has to be correlated with the following frame through a connection on graphic elements, in which the mermaid appears in an art-deco interior, in the form of a girl seen naked in a semi-contre-jour among empty wine bottles and open books.
The lyrics 'I wanna stay inside all day, I want the world to go away / [...] I wanna be a real fake' are juxtaposed with a montage in which we see the young woman full of so-called regrets, putting on her makeup similar to the Hollywood movie stars of the '50s. The critique of the way society treats women is visually translated with beauty-grotesque antitheses, just as the song adjoins contradictory feelings through puns or the ironic nature of the lyrics. Even in the title of the song, the artist decided to replace the word idol with idle, which even if pronounced the same, gives a completely different nuance to the message. The teen idol specific to the western culture of the '80s, is now replaced by the "indolent teenager" (teen idle), and Marina rhymes these phrases with the word suicidal, once again pointing out the critical way in which she relates to society. Next, I chose to bring to the chorus a visual support that would intrigue and shock at the same time. The lion lying on the floor next to the protagonist of the video, in an intentionally hyper-dramatized setting, reminds of the danger and temptations of the world, where luxury, sublime and fame endanger the integrity, well-being or even the life of those who want them.
Almost theatrically, this setting is followed by a black and white flashback, where the protagonist seems to enjoy life in the company of another girl, who got lost on the way looking for the Prom Queen title.
In the following frames, the protagonist is seen touching her abdominal area, as if she were carrying a fetus in her womb, while reciting the lyrics 'I wanna be a virgin pure'. Then, on a bed with white bedding, the image of the woman is now associated with that of Marilyn Monroe, a reference that I tried to emphasize using similar makeup and hair, on a mise-en-scene inspired by Milton Greene's photos of Marilyn . The lyrics that adhere to these frames are: 'A 21st century whore / I want back my virginity / So I can feel infinity'. Even though Marilyn was part of the previous century, her legend still goes on. The red and purple frames, in which the young woman in the video crashes the grapes on her groin area, refer to the way in which female eroticism has been fetishized throughout history. By simulating masturbation, these images are intended to open a conversation among a potential audience, raising the issue of worshiping the female body as an entity intended for male pleasure, excluding the purpose of satisfying themselves.
Also, the frames in which the corpse of the girl who no longer wanted to face society and a culture full of preconceptions is bathed in camera flashes, overlap the lyrics 'super, super, super suicidal/ [...] Adolescence didn't make sense, A little loss of innocence'. The protagonist of the video gradually loses her individuality in favor of acquiring a universal one. Suicide among teenagers is a big issue of our society, and the fact that Marina And the Diamonds is campaigning for these causes has once again led me to approach this project.
The mermaid, whose image is seen throughout the video in short close-ups, is an alter ego of the young woman and her very presence works, in my opinion, as an irony to the way society treats women - we do not share the same concepts with a mermaid, whose power of seduction brings death. We can feel attraction or hatred towards a mermaid, but never understanding and compassion.
The image of Venus in Botticelli's masterpiece is glimpsed among tar drips, suggesting that beauty is ephemeral, that exoticism brought to women is an outdated concept that must be left in the Renaissance, and that regardless of gender, we are all destined to a common end.
I chose to use the 4: 3 aspect ratio in this audio-visual product, due to the claustrophobic to simulate a nostalgic image, evoking the atmosphere of domestic films recorded on Super 8 formats in the '70s, but also to simulate the aesthetic of the Hollywood glamour of the '50s. In terms of visual effects, in addition to some scenes in which I used matte painting and 3D compositing, most interventions consisted of color grading, post-production damage, such as the addition of chromatic aberrations, the use of flares for cuts, or overlays with dust and scratches.
