Music Video Analysis: Zombie - Cranberries

This music video uses an effective lyric and visual relationship. The video mainly focuses on three different narratives that all link, as well as performance of the group itself. The lyrics and video link to war and the black and white editing with high contrast depict soldiers and young children pretending to fight a war. This Irish rock band create the song Zombie in protest to the conflict in Northern Ireland, and the 'zombie' that is often referred to can represent war which takes over. The mise-en-scene provokes realism with casual clothing, however the scene of the main singer painted gold and standing at a cross stands out. The costume is similar to that of ancient Egyptian make-up and i like how the slow panning and tilting shots make the lyrics feel more personal. It does this by showing the main vocalist (painted in gold) singing the song whilst showing mental distress over violence and death, with the many children surrounding her acting like her children that are also effected.

I think this video represents violence in many difference situations. For example the black and white images of soldiers on road sides and destroyed buildings generally depicts war, and the images of children fighting could also depict bullying, as some scenes seem to become progressively aggressive. I also find the use of the colour scene when a dog is focused on eating some large bones. This use of intertextuality is effective and makes the song more relatable.

There are a lot of low angle shots in many of the different situations and i think this is effective in making the viewer feel like the visuals they are seeing is uncontrollable, and to me helps to feel the emotion and frustration of the lyrics and the gold painted singer. Close up shots are used for this character and i think they further make her emotions feel more believable. Editing between shots is irregular but usually matches the rhythm of the music. I also noticed that one young boy shown in the gold scenes is also one of the young boys pretending to be in a fight or war in the black and white scenes. This to me could show how violence can effect people, particularly young children exposed to it.

The group itself is shown to be smart casual, occasionally shown in colour with red glows.the focus here is not the band themselves, but the narrative and lyrics that they're using to convey the meaning of the song.