Textual Analysis - scouting for girls - She's so lovely

Genre 

The genre of the video is pop, rock matching its artist. The narrative of the video is a mix between the lead vocalist bowling and falling for a girl who is both beautiful and really talented at bowling who he is trying hard to impress without getting in trouble with her boyfriend While the boyfriend is there, Roy tells the girl she looks beautiful. The boyfriend gets angry, but gets called away for his throw. As he scores a strike, and a performance of him and the rest of the band singing the song.  

Narrative
The narrative has the complete cycle for Todorov Equliliburum theory with equilibrium at the start with everyone bowling, the distribution happening when the girl walks in and turns the head of everyone in the alley causing chaos as they all cant concentrate. there's realisation where the protagonist tells the girl she's beautiful and upsets her boyfriend, there is an attempt at repair where they begin to bowl against each other, and then equilibrium when the woman leaves with the protagonist while her boyfriend (the villain charter) is distracted.

The recognisable characters in the video are the hero (the main vocalist), a princess (pretty girl) and a villain / false hero her boyfriend. the video reflects the lyrics but subtly so the actions eco the words but are not a completely literal representation.  

The video represents themes of gender stereotypically with use of male gaze theory, and the girl he is singing about being shown as a beautiful woman with her boyfriend at times using her as an object /arm candy representing male stereotypically as well.
The artist playing the hero in the video is constructed to look like a geeky bowler to conetate he is a shy ordinary guy to make him overcome his fear to ask her out that much more a triumph.

The video is set in three locations, the bowling alley, the dinner and the room where the band is performing. The bowling alley is the main location where all the drama happens and is just a standard kind of retro alley. The dinner is designed to look like an American one that you get on the side of the road however it appears to be attached as just an extra part of the alley. the final location looks like a living room converted into a rehearsal area with lower key lighting compared to the alley the narrative is taking place.

Camera
The main shots used through out are close ups and extreme close ups and are used in an almost comedic way to tell the narrative almost completely using male gaze theory as all the guys at the alley stare and the woman the song is about is angled up to look really pretty. there are also a lot of extreme close ups on the singers face in the performance shots, however using Goodwin's theory where the record label wants a certain amount of close ups in order to promote him as the image for scouting for girls.

Audience
The Audience for this video is mostly young adults (at time of release) as its stereotypically to what many where doing at that time being part of a bowling club.


Looking at this video it has helped me to understand how to create a good strong narrative using lots of fast paced shots. It has also given me an idea of how to edit our own video with good transitions between narrative and performance, and a fast paced used to give  a comedic style narrative that almost makes you laugh along next to the song when telling the story.