Paramore – Misery Business

Paramore as band got very big very quick when they released their second album ‘Riot!’ January 2007 they became an instant hit. One of their most famous and popular songs from his album is called Misery Business. I’ve chosen to look at this video because the idea of powerful women is prominent throughout. The band in itself is made up of four men and one lead singer who’s a female who is constantly portrayed as being the small but strong one, also as ‘One of the lads’.

The music video begins on a very brief extreme close up shot of Hayley Williams, the lead singer, opening her eyes and looking directly into the camera. Her bright orange hair is used as a statement that says “I don’t care what people think of me”

Instantly afterwards images of the band playing flash on the screen with the bold graffiti style writing all over the background walls saying the word ‘Riot!’ The word riot in itself gives an image of anger and rebellion again helping with the videos theme, Riot! Also happens to be the name of the album that the song was taken from.The album art for Riot! Is the same image as the background walls, This was interesting as it showed me that the band used a scene from their video as the album cover which shows it is not unusual of bands of this genre to do this meaning my production could have this and it would be typical of the genre.

Album cover for Riot!

Shots from the video

Throughout the video a strong contrast is drawn between Hayley and another women in a typical American high school setting which throughout mainly highlights the key stereotypical female images in the high school setting, from the Cheerleaders to bullies, to the quite girl.

The girl centered is the rival girl, the lyrics at the bottom sugest her to be a dominant female like Hayley Williams but whom goes about displaying it in a completely different manner, in her case she bullies others.

The idea of being ‘fake’ is used also by showing the Bully to be devastated without the façade she puts on with all the makeup and tough attitude when in reality she is just a normal girl. The video shows Hayley Williams and the bully standing face to face with the bully having a significantly larger size difference her height of which usually helps with intimidation. The camera is at the same level for both of them, this helps to show that to have the same respect level you don’t need all he cosmetic stuff on to cover yourself up. Hayley is shown to be wiping off layers of makeup of the bullies face and pulling out breast enlargement pads, She is wearing all black clothing signifying simplicity but still has the dominance effect without the need for artificial enhancements. This is shown below.

Throughout the video a lot of hand held camera shots are used on the shots of the band performing giving the effect of a amateur video, this effect helps the audience to relate to the band and see them at the same level as them and along with her singing into the camera helps with it feeling more personal.

From this video I have learnt a lot about the way certain filming techniques are used to create the powerful women character on screen, I hope to incorporate several of these techniques and apply them to my own project.