Textual Analysis 3 - Arctic Monkeys 'Leave Before The Lights Come On'

Genre: Indie Rock, Alternative rock, Garage rock, post-punk revival
Structure: narrative
Written by: Alex Turner
Director: John Hardwick
The video for Arctic Monkeys – Leave Before The Lights Come On is a full narrative video with no footage of performance. This is unconventional of genre as most videos for the alternative/ indie rock genre have a lot of performance to show that they play their own instruments and have talent instead of having it put in for them like pop music. The video features Kate Ashfield (Shaun of the Dead) and Paddy Considine (Hot Fuzz) who are both already stand-alone actors which widens the audience of the music video because the two actors will already have fans so they will attract there fans to see the video. Having two established actors in the music video also shows that the budget for the video was quite large. At the beginning of the video, Considine is walking down a street which looks like it was shot without a steadicam as the shot is quite wobbly but stable enough to clearly make out what is happening. It then makes a cross cut to Ashfield with a medium close up of her face making it unclear that she is stood on top of a building which makes it more shocking to the audience when the video cuts to an extreme long shot of her revealing where she is. There is a lot of empty space in the long shot of her leaning over the edge of the building which allows the audience to look at the shot with more background details to put emphasis on the height that she is stood at. This is also done by using a high angle which makes the space gap from the audiences view to the floor even further. The second shot of Considine walking shows that the two events are happening simultaneously and shows how oblivious to it he is. A low angle on Ashfield makes two pans back and forth across her face to show her fear and possibly vertigo from being at the ledge. After seeing Ashfield, Considine ran up to the roof to stop her from jumping and they both go to a café for a cup of tea/coffee and calm down however Ashfield obviously wants a relationship with Considine whereas he only saved her life because it was the right thing to do and doesn’t seem to want anything in return. This is shown by the use of lighting as Ashfield has a warm glow on her face with the bright lights from the display cabinet behind her and Considine has no excessive glow on his face and has the window behind him showing the gloomy looking sky. It is also shown through the use of body language used by Ashfield as she touches her face and hair a lot. Ashfield rests her had on Consides hand as he went to leave the café which is a literal use of the metaphor “put your head in my hands” which means stay with me showing that she doesn’t want him to leave her. She then goes to kiss Considine but he pulls away and reveals his wedding ring. The mid close up shot used to fit both characters into the shot allows the audience to see the two reactions. Both of the characters look quite embarrassed however the warm glow is still on Ashfield’s face showing that she is still attracted to him. As Considine walks out of the café and Ashfield watches, the warm glow in her face goes away and leaves her face grey almost as a silhouette showing that he has left her feeling empty now that he isn’t around. Ashfield immediately runs after him and jumps on his back as he walks making him think he’s being attacked and carries on walking away from her making her chase him down an alleyway. As he walks his footsteps match the beat of the bass guitar in the song which makes the video come together as a music video rather than just a clip from a film or TV show. Ashfield runs to another entrance to the alleyway s that Considine doesn’t see her coming and run away. When she catches up to him she pushes him and looks angry showing that the affection she had for him earlier in the video has gone. After being pushed Considine also looks angry and starts shouting at Ashfield and pushes her up against a fence and threatened her which shows a contrast as at the beginning of the video he was saving her life. Ashfield tries to kiss Considine again when he has her pinned up against the fence and the warm glow is back on her face showing that although they are fighting and he is threatening her, she feels affectionate towards him again. After Considine walks away again, Ashfield runs back to the top of a building that she was shown to be about to jump from at the beginning of the video showing that the reason that she was there in the first place was because someone had broken her heart. However, It shows her standing and waiting for someone to walk past before purposely kicking her shoe off in front of them. The wide angle shot of Matt Helders (the drummer of Arctic Monkeys) walking down the street in a similar fashion to Considine did at the beginning of the video shows that Ashfield was standing at the top of the building for attention rather than because she was genuinely going to kill herself. That being said, she could just be looking for love and by coming to stop her from jumping from the building she sees that as a sign of affection. The idea of going back to a destructive pattern of relationships is something that I would like to attempt with my video as it would match the lyric, ‘another lesson that has gone unlearned’.
             The band is Arctic Monkeys, who started out in Sheffield and have since gone on to become one of the most popular contemporary indie rock bands in the world. The video was shot in the Cultural Industries Quarter of Sheffield because that is where the band used to perform before they became famous. The Ideology of the video is hard to pick out however the band chose to have it filmed in Sheffield which is where they originated from showing that they believe in staying close to home.
              The digesis of the video is hard to pick out any real ideology because it was purely narrative, meaning that there is no set in stone meaning to the video. However it does touch on suicide as Ashfield is threatening to jump from the building at both the beginning and the end of the video, domestic violence as the two start arguing in the street and other people start staring and then they have a bit of a fight in the alley way and it also touches mental health as you could argue that Ashfield’s character has some form of mental disorder which is making her want to do this as a sane person wouldn’t think to pretend to be suicidal just so that someone will possibly love them.
              The primary audience of the video will be Arctic Monkeys fans which are vary varied in both age difference and demographics. The usual age for Arctic Monkeys is 14-40 and the ABC1 demographic can vary throughout all of the demographic stages. There will be a secondary audience for the video though, that is Ashfield and Considine fans who will watch the video to see them performing.