Director Background
Jonathan Glazer has been an avid director of various forms since the mid-90s, during which he worked on adverts for several big-name companies such as Nike and Kodak. This led to him directing music videos for hits from Massive Attack (for whom he directed Karmacoma, which had several clever correlations to The Shining), Radiohead, Blur, UNKLE and The Dead Weather. He also directed the gangster film “Sexy Beast”, and won MTV’s director of the year award in 1997.
Glazer has a very unique directing style in that his videos have a huge impact on the viewer, even with little use of editing and special effects. The narrative and meaning behind the aesthetics of the videos are extremely important, as a deeper message is usually contained within the narrative. Shots are often held for much longer than usual, which builds suspense and adds to the realism. His videos contain a recurring theme of travelling, whether it be someone walking (as viewable in Rabbit in Your Headlights) or driving (Karma Police); mystery is a common, important factor in his videos, as a lot of questions often go intentionally unanswered. Glazer has previously worked with Thom Yorke (the vocalist of the track) during the video he created for Radiohead’s Karma Police.
Artist, Song & Genre
UNKLE are an electronic duo consisting of James Lavelle and Tim Goldsworthy (although for a brief period of time they were labelled as triphop), who formed in '94 and often incorporate guest artists and producers into their tracks, and this one is no exception. They are usually best categorised simply as electronic, but this is no usual track, and they are propelled into a much more experimental style of music with the aid of Thom Yorke’s “moody” vocals. The song also contained many samples from sources ranging from quotes from “Jacob’s Ladder” a 1990 thriller, from which the track also takes its title, to Dutch Band “Supersister”.
UNKLE, having collaborated with many artists in their near-two-decade lifespan, have a lot of experience which really shows in this song. Some artists who've made guest appearances on their tracks include Massive Attack, Queens of the Stone Age and Beastie Boys, so they are no strangers to working with rock artists.
Radiohead themselves have delved into the realms of electronica with the release of their Kid A album, incorporating various elements of the genre into music of their own style, which is perhaps why Yorke was particularly excited about collaborating with UNKLE.
Audience
The music video for this track has seen over 1 million hits since '06, although there have been various releases of the song on Youtube, which amounts to even more hits, essentially placing the song at a near 2 million play count.
The target audience of this music is so broad, that there’s no surprise as to why it’s accompanying YouTube video has over 1 million hits. Essentially anyone already a fan of Radiohead (who’re number 1 for play counts on popular music forum and radio website Last.fm's rock category), UNKLE, Thom Yorke and electronic would be drawn to this track.
To fully assess this particular song's target audience, you have to realise that the multiple artists allows for a much wider demographic, especially when considering that Thom Yorke is a part of one of the biggest bands currently out there. So firstly, I will evaluate Thom Yorke's influence on the attention this song acquired.
During the era that this song was released, fans of Radiohead were impatiently waiting on the edge of their proverbial seats for any new releases from Thom Yorke, so when this song was released to the masses, it came as no surprise that a portion of the attention the song attracted was thanks to Yorke. Radiohead's demographic are preferably 14-19 year old males, especially teenagers growing up in the 90's who had the delight of hearing Creep for the first time in '92.
UNKLE's target audience are, I believe, a bit more sophisticated/older than Radiohead fans. Again, I think it would mainly be males who are attracted to this song, possibly in their early 20s. The sophistication stems from the overall minimalistic yet stylish feel that the duo has about them, and their album covers are quite dark and masculine.
Due to the large amounts of collaborations that UNKLE have had, their name is recognised amongst fans of other diverse genres, and this popularity has gained them even more success with future releases.
Style
This is undoubtedly a narrative music video, although there is a much deeper message beneath the surface. The religious references throughout the track often sync up with the video itself, and is a perfect example of the two forms working in harmony to establish an even more spectacular piece of art.
Textual Analysis
Even within the first few seconds of this video, we immediately find ourselves with a lot of questions - “Who is this man?”, “Where is he going?”, “Why is he walking in the road?” This element of mystery, classic to Glazer, is already established within the opening 20 seconds. Throughout the video we are able to hear the diegetic sounds (cars driving past and horns blaring) as well as non-diegetic sounds (the song itself, along with the vocals), and these often synchronise as viewable at 00:20. The first line of the song “I’m a rabbit in your headlights” is sung instantly as the camera cuts to a shot of the rear-view mirror, displaying the man walking down the road.
The man himself, (played by Denis Lavant) wears a heavy parka and makes sporadic movements with his arms as he travels down the road. He also shouts out often inaudible phrases, although some words can be made out such as “Cristos!” and “Shimmer!” Cristos – which is Latin for Christ- is shouted angrily, almost as if the man is having trouble dealing with the concept of Christ. My interpretation of this video as an entirety is that the road represents the man’s life, and we can see that although he is walking on the right side of the road (possibly a symbol that he’s keeping on the “straight and narrow”) he is often barraged by problems in the form of the cars hitting him.
There is extremely little evidence of editing during the main body of this video, the only real time editing is used, is to cut between different shots of the man. Every shot of the man whilst he is walking is either low-angle or level with him, never a high-angle shot, and these shots can vary from close-ups of his face as he’s shouting, to medium shots as the camera tracks alongside him. The first time we get a medium-long/long shot is when he gets hits by a car. This is done so that the viewer can witness the impact of the force that the car has on him, we can also see from this shot (which is extended by a few seconds to show this) that nobody around has stopped to help him, or even cares. The camera then cuts to a steady close-up of the man lying on the ground after the hit, and although we hear the line “Fat bloody fingers/are sucking your soul away” as his hands come into focus on the screen whilst he lifts himself up, it’s more likely to be a reference to greedy corporations. He summons the strength to carry on his journey, but is soon hit by another businessman as Thom Yorke sings out “Christian Suburbanite”, creating more religious correlations. We can now see that this video has a lot of parallels with the story of The Good Samaritan. Soon after, a car pulls up alongside the man and the non-diegetic music fades out, which bring the diegetic noises of the “conversation” and the cars and radio to the forefront of the scene. The man in the car represents the Good Samaritan, and although he opts for pulling up alongside the man, instead of getting out of his car and formally addressing him, he feels his conscience is cleared as he has clearly done more than anyone else. The man however, completely shuts out and ignores the stranger’s somewhat-good intentions, representing that he would rather travel down his road of life alone than accept help.
Another moment where the lyrics synchronise nicely is when the line “I’m losing my patience” is sung, and the man’s sporadic arm movements become more frequent, and his shouting intensified. The man is hit three more times before he starts to take action. The music gets louder as he rips off his parker, revealing his cut and bruised torso/arms. The parker here represents the protective coat he has over his life, which has actually been encumbering him, blinding him. He walks several more steps before coming to a halt, as the diegetic noises completely stop, leaving only the soft piano music to accompany his following actions. We see the man smile here for the first time, as he slowly raises his arms in a Crucifix-esque manner. The car which hits him, which would usually knock him down, smashes against the man, completely destroying itself on impact.
When the man realises that the problems hitting him were due to his blindness, he is able to tear away from that and stand tall, granting him Herculean strength, enabling him to take anything which hits him. The smoke accompanied with the crash enshrouds the man, acting as a fitting outro to an excellent music video.
Production Trivia
The video uses a technique which Glazer would later use for the "A Song For The Lover's" video, being shot in real-time, allowing the diegetic sounds produced by the cars and characters to be audible above the track (which is non-diegetic).
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