The Lady is a Tramp

Tony Bennet and Lady Gaga's music video for the song Lady is a Tramp.

Their music video is a performance based video to a jazz song. A typical convention of of jazz music videos is that they tend to contain quite upbeat emotions which make the audience smile. This is seen within their video becuase they both have a light, happy attitude and body language which is clear to the audience, helping to make the audience feel relaxed and enjoy the song. They are both smiling and laughing a lot throughout the song as well, helping to create the upbeat atmosphere  and make the audience smile. They also manage to create the happy atmosphere through the little dances they do throughout the song, as again it creates a relaxed yet upbeat atmosphere. This happy mood is continued through the use of bright lights, another convention of a jazz music video.

The brights lights are used to create the happy mood for the audience as the brightness links to the idea daylight and sunshine. Another use that bright lights have is drawing attention. By having a brightly lit music video it attracts the attention of the audience. The bright lights can be seen throughout their video as the studio

that they are filming in is clearly lit up brightly. They also place emphasis on the use of lighting within the video because it starts by fading in from a blurred dimness into a bright sharp focus shot. The next convention of a jazz music video is that there is a large performance space. Throughout the images seen in this post it is quite clear that the space that they are filming in is very large and open creating a light atmosphere which appeals to the audience. However, in a lot of jazz music videos there are multiple locations so as to keep and emphasise the energy of the song this isn't seen within their video. The reason for this could be because the energy is created and emphaised by the artists themselves, espcecially Lady Gaga. She moves around the space and dances throughout the video, keeping the atmosphere light and energetic through her movements.

The costumes in jazz music videos are often sophisticated. Alongside her movements, the camera itself tends to pan alot and move around the space, focusing on the artists throughout, helping to keep the energy up as it means there is a lot of movement. The men tend to wear suits and the women tend to wear dresses. Both artsits conform to this, seen through Tonny Bennet's suit and Lady Gaga's black dress. His tie is also black, which matches with her dress, showing sophistication and elegance. Their costumes can clearly be seen in the long shot in the image. The elegant, sophistication of the costumes within jazz music videos reflects the older years. Another aspect that reflects the older years is the use of the old fashioned microphones. These old fashioned microphones are typically used within jazz music videos as they hint at the older years which jazz songs typically represent. One major way in which this video does not conform to the conventions of a jazz music video is the setting. Jazz music videos are typically set in lots of older, run down places to create a light, 'old school' atmosphere. This video is set within a clean, white studio. The reason for this could be because Lady Gaga doesn't come across as old enough to have the old fashioned, 'old school' atmosphere and so the setting is more suited to her. Overall, this video tends to comform to the majority of the conventions of a jazz music video.

Target Audience

Our target audience is teenagers, and mainly females. This is because we can relate to both aspects of the target audience which is beneficial in helping us to make sure that the video is something the audience will enjoy. The following prezie is all about are target audience :

Hard Out Here

Lilly Allen’s music video to her song ‘Hard out Here’ represents the oppression that women face from men. The first shot seen is an aerial pan showing her lying on an operating table, surrounded by men working on her body. This immediately creates the idea that men decide what happens to women’s bodies and how they should look. The use of an American doctor on a British patient suggests that it is American’s that are the main cause for men having the power over women’s bodies, as well as the idea that the need to physically change the way that women look has been created through America, due to the large impact it has on other countries. The dialogue at the beginning shows how an unfit man is judging her body, while she feels the need to defend herself by stating that she has had two children. The other man then stereotypes that women ‘get like this’ after they have had children, showing how the two men are judging women and their bodies. The cut away to a shot of a TV showing a stereotypical music video of young, attractive females in small amounts of clothing dancing provocatively shows the audience how women are told they should look. Lilly Allen’s voice during the dialogue is timid and weak; however it changes instantly when she starts singing to a more confident, strong voice. The lyrics throughout the song are highlighting the sexism towards women. An example of this is when she sings ‘I don’t need to shake my arse for you because I’ve got a brain’. These is instantly highlighting how women are seen as stupid and rely upon their bodies to get far in life, however she does not need to.  Straight after these lyrics there is shot showing the liposuction, suggesting that it the girls how believe they need their bodies to get by in life that go through those sorts of treatments. The lyrics ‘it’s time to speed it up because I can’t move at this pace’ suggest that she is ahead of most people in the belief that men and women are equal and that women don’t need to show off their bodies for men. The overall theme of the music video suggests that it is a stereotypical female music video, where the women are showing of their bodies and dancing provocatively. There are many close up and long shots showing the lack of clothing on the women and the full suits that the men are wearing. The body language and dancing of the women is the typical open leg dance

which is seen in a lot of music videos these days as it makes the women look sexual, something that will please the men. The look of the entire video agrees with both Berger and Mulvey’s idea of the male gaze and that ‘men look, women appear’. The way the women are dressed and dancing is for the pleasure of the men viewing the video. However, the lyrics of the song contradict everything that is visually shown. With the visuals and the lyrics together the music video can be said to be making fun of other, more typical music videos. The fact that Lilly Allen is completely clothed, despite the fact the clothes are body hugging, shows that she still doesn’t want to show off her entire body just for a video. During the chorus, there is a mid- shot showing Lilly Allen trying to get one of the men to twerk;

another dance move which is provocative. The man is struggling to do it properly. The editing then cuts away to a close up of the women dancing, and then back to the man who is now saying no. This shot is a low angle, which shows power. Depending on the situation this power could have been given to either the women of the man. However, due to the fact that the man is saying no and choosing not to dance I would say that he has the power in this shot. The idea of the men having power is, again, typical within these music videos. Using Dyers idea on stereotypes being about power, and those with power stereotyping those with less power we can establish an idea that the man in the video is stereotyping the women to

 be dumb. Due to the suit that he is wearing, it is safe to assume that he is someone with power as he is well dressed. The mid shot of her in the kitchen washing the car wheel plates fits in with the stereotypical idea that women should be in the kitchen and cleaning. The shot then shows the man come in telling her how to do it properly suggesting that he believes she isn’t smart enough to know how to do it herself. He also then tells her to look sexier towards the camera which she does; going back to Berger and Mulvey’s ideas on the male gaze. There is another shot linking to this later on in the video, in which the same guy is getting her to seductively eat a banana, again linking to the idea of women being

objectified by men, a topic which comes in the lyrics of the song. Keeping the idea of the male gaze in mind, there is another close-up shot showing one of the women dancing while another puts money down her top. This creates the idea of strippers, which again goes back to the thought that women are there for the men to look at and objectify.  With the theme of this video being to make fun of other music videos and contradict them, there is a shot which

mimics a shot seen in a video made by an artist earlier that year. This shot shows her dancing around balloons which spell out a description of her body. The use of this is to highlight how people don’t care when a man does it however; if a woman does it they become more outraged. This is made clear through the lyrics ‘inequality’ and ‘injustice’. The overall effect of this song and video on the audience is to raise their awareness of the sexism within music videos towards women. The use of the continuous contradiction between the lyrics and the visuals shows the audience not only how women are typically portrayed within in videos, but also to question why it is necessary. The purpose of this video is to make the audience think while watching it,