Despite it turning almost 30 years old soon, the song best exhibits what I think of as a message in a rap song, a throwback to how Grandmaster Flash & The Furios Five would have defined the core of Hip-Hop culture. The video clip is a great example of how to combine the lyrics of a song with a crystal clear visual language, highlighting the essential statements while still following the flow of the rhythm. All while mixing up relatively simple visual techniques into a great storytelling formula.
Plot
The song is about a young poor black man living with his family in a part of town where drug dealers are the most prominent appearance on the streets. Not getting any or only low paid work, he starts to make quick cash by doing little errands for one of the dealers. Rising up the young man is able to support his family and start his own drug dealing business and expand, ultimately leading to conflict with his original boss. Wanting to secure his place in the business, he takes his crew on a revenge action. By hitting a policeman in the ensuing shootout with the rival drug dealer, the ending implies an early end to the young man's drug dealing career in prison or getting shot in return by the police.
Lighting
This gives off the effect like the scene would be coming out of a black canvas, a technique that in painting is know as Chiaroscuro. Following are three examples of Chiaroscuro by Caravaggio, Gerrit van Honthurst and Rembrandt:
Location
Locations are shown by the most simple way of placing an object in the background. As these locations are generally known to the audience and not of the unusual, together with the spoken word it is enough to evoke the image. In Comics this is known as between-the-panels or Closure, where the reader fills in the gap between to pictures with his own imagination. The same happens here: we don't need any more information, we know these places. The viewer gets even more involved by giving him the space to fill in the blanks by himself.
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| Scott McCloud's theory of Closure and how the reader mentally constructs a continuous unified reality. |
Props & Hand Actions
A few props and some explicitly shown actions of hand illustrate story-points of the narration, sometimes in a symbolically and wittingly way. These act like highlights increasing a dramatic effect and adding urgency to the flow of the story.
Character Development
As the protagonist is rising through the ranks of a drug dealer, he is able to support the people around him. This is reflected in their clothing and jewelry.
Groups
Characters are grouped in a single shot, sometimes frontal in the background, sometimes in profile in a line retreating from fore to back. This mirrors how the lights are used, either from above or from the side. This arrangement allows for quick reads from the viewers: since all characters are associated in one shot, you immediately get a sense of the meaning of the context.
Elements Of Surprise
There are some visual elements sprinkled into the sequence, that do not fall into any of the above categories. They serve as little visual jokes and add a lot of interest with their element of surprise. They also loosen up what would otherwise have become a repetitive formula.
Take note of how people are shown that got shot: the way they are
animated as 'flying off into the sky' adds a layer of symbolically used
animation.
Conclusion
This video clip uses a visual language for which I have found no comparison. It makes use of a few simple but highly effective means of narration that are held together by a strict discipline. Yet at the same time it is kept lose enough, to sprinkle in inventive bits to break its own rhythm. The simplified usage of lighting, staging, action and props is great example for every visual storyteller.
Unfortunately I have not been able to find any background information on who shot this video or what was used for inspiration. Should there be any info out there, please let me know.
I hope you enjoyed this article, if you have any thoughts, please let me know in the comments!
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