New Narrative

Our new narrative is vastly different to the old in both meaning and style. Our new video has a deep sense of love and heartbreak and so is a lot less abstract than the previous idea of childhood and postmodernity. It also a lot more relatable to than the previous idea as many people have experienced love and heartbreak and even if they haven't experienced it personally then they would know about the feelings and expectations as it is common in our society; we wanted to tell a story rather than just imply it.

Our narrative begins with a flashback on our two characters. It shows a loving relationship between the two as they playfully run in a field holding hands and hugging. This flashback helps to establish the relationship from the beginning and how much love the couple share. It is quite clichéd in how we expressed love but this is the effect we wanted as many people desire this carefree love that has become clichéd. We thought that a voiceover would also be effective over this scene to give a retrospective view from the girl after the break up. This establishes the emotion of the song and video from the onset.

We got the idea of a voiceover from Rihanna's 'We Found Love' video:

This video begins with a voiceover which we thought was extremely effective. The song itself also creates a meaning which is similar to the one which we desire. We deliberated using the actual lines which are said in Rihanna's video as they are perfect for the story which we want to tell of a break up but decided against it as we didn't want it to be a replica of rihanna's voiceover scene. And so after some research, we found a quote from Marilyn Monroe which we have decided to use:

"I believe that everything happens for a reason.
People change so that you can learn to let go.
Things go wrong so that you can appreciate them when they're right.
You believe lies so that you eventually learn to trust no one but yourself.
Sometimes things fall apart so that better things can all fall together."

We believed that this quote is perfect as it shows what the protagonist is feeling at that moment in time. It's also heavily emotive and so opens up the girls emotions from the beginning. From a practical point of view, it introduces the concept of a break up from the onset meaning that when the songs begins we can initiate the break up feelings straight away with no introduction and so the video is more synchronous to the lyrics. We also want to add background music, in the form of a piano, to the voiceover to emphasise the emotion further. We have decided upon a piano rendition of 'Jar of Hearts' as it will link onto the actual song easily as well as having silent gaps between the piano chords to allow clarity for the voiceover.

As the song begins, we see the boy writing a love letter to his lover. After a failed attempt, he screws up the piece of paper and discards it before texting her saying 'I love you.' We then see the letter beginning to move as it opens itself up and then crawls off the desk. The letter travels down a set of stairs and into a kitchen before climbing up a fridge. The fridge holds a picture of the girl who is standing in a park setting. We intend to get the letter to climb into the picture of the girl and follow her. The girl, who will still be in the picture, will turn and walk away. This creates a graphic match to the next scene, where we see the letter travelling through wooded area trying to find the girl.

During the video, we intend for the letter to carry on following the girl through different terrains as it gradually gets more dirty and rugged. Intergrated bewteen these scenes we will see footage of the girl walking aimlessly, alone, to create a connection to the flashback at the start and to make it obvious that there is tension in the couple. The girl will look solemn and lost to exaggerate her feelings about the boy. Nearing the end of the video, we will see the letter travel in a car away from the town and to an isolated high point. The girl will be sitting on a rock, looking out to the horizon as the letter crawls up to her. She looks towards the lette, picking it up and reading it. She then proceeds to the edge of a rock edge before scunching up the letter and throwing it off the edge. The girl will the walk higher up the rock formation before stopping and standing at the edge of a high point. The video will then end, leaving the audience unclear as to what will happen.

The main goal of our video is to create emotion with the audience. We are trying to personify the letter to create a feeling of sorrow and sympathy for the letter. We will then interject the clips of the girl to create more sympathy for the situation. By showing a contrast between the happy emotions, created by the flashback, and the melancholy feelings we are forcing the audience to have an emotive reaction, linking with the emotions created by the song itself.