Rihanna Disturbia Music Video Georgina Pollard 28.09.09 Rihanna’s video for ‘Disturbia’ was released in 2008. The song was originall written by Chris Brown and was considered for the rerelease of his album ‘Exclusive’. However Chris felt that the song would be better sung by a female artist. Def Jam records originally wanted to save the song ‘Disturbia’ for Rihanna’s next album in 2009 this was because of her recent release of ‘Take a bow’ for her new album ‘Good Girl gone Bad’. A new Rihanna was advertised to us on releasing this album; her appearance had changed from a cute ‘girly girly’ to a sexy adult highlighting the fact that she had grown up and was no longer a ‘Good Girl’. Before…. After….
However after consideration Def Jam felt that the song was a ‘summer song’ and should be released as soon as possible as a follow up to ‘Take a Bow’. ‘Disturbia’ spent 2 weeks at number one in the uk charts beating her song ‘Take a Bow’. It spent 11 weeks in the uk charts top 10 and held the record for being the highest number of sold down loads, selling 300, 000 copies of the song. The main word that pops into to your head after watching the music video ‘Disturbia’ is ‘disturbing’. The song begins with the sound of fingers running along a piano as we
hear this we see a black piano with a hand dangling from the top of the piano running their fingers along the keys. The fingers are painted black with have long finger nails which immediately cautions the audience. There is then a close up of Rihanna dangling over the piano in a black leotard with dark make up. Initially when we see her the audience feel reassured that ‘every thing is going to be ok’ despite the fact that we can still hear strange untuned noised from the piano creating an uneasy feeling. The ‘reassurance’ is dropped once we see the miseenscene to the music video which looks like a surrealistic torture chamber where Rihanna is seen sitting on a black leather chair appearing in control whilst her chair is spinning; strange characters surround her doing confusing and strange things. For example a large pale man with an eye patch is seen spinning two steering wheels with his arms.
When the main song kicks in and we hear ‘Dum dum de dum..’ Fast pace editing is used to match the beat of the music as well as creating a sense of confusion in the audience. We see Rihanna with a short cut blonde bob with contact lenses making her eyes look all white as if her eyes have rolled to the back of her hear making her look demented and crazed. During this seen we see her trapped behind bars with two body guard’s ether side. This contradicted the audience first impression of her looking in control and emphasizing the name of the album ‘Good Girl Gone Bad’ by seeing Rihanna be hind bars. Edits have been fast forward and choppy movements have been used this seems like there is a lack of order, every thing is disjointed and messy adding tension which draws the audience in. The merged and over lapped shots make the audience distorted with the confusion of not knowing where to look. This also creates an idea of ‘schizophrenia’, on one hand we see a close ups of Rihanna’s face with bright red lipstick on looking sexy and ‘sane’ on the other hand we see long shots of her screaming, looking animalistic and ‘insane’. The chorus later comes in with “Put on your pretty lies, you’re in the city of wonder”. At this point we see a long shot of Rihanna being raised at arms length above a crowds head with hands reaching out to touch her. This is symbolic of her star quality and how she is above every one else and almost untouchable. We see some
scenes of an almost ‘dance routine’ where the group move in a robotic way to the music but the posture almost displays some thing monster like for example a zombie. This draws the audience in by creating a ‘wow’ factor and creating questions in the audiences head encouraging them to watch more. Moving on in the video there is a section where Rihanna is attached to a post surrounded by fire, almost as if she is being burnt at the stake. Joan of arc was a strong heroine of France and led the French army into several important battles and victories. She was burnt at the stake in 1426 due to the fact that she claimed she had divined guidance, some didn’t believe her and thought she was just hearing voices and therefore was a witch. By showing Rihanna burning at the stake shows that she is like Joan of arc and adds to the ‘disturbed’ element of the video as it show on one hand that she is hearing voices, on the other it displays her as a martyr and a heroine to her fans. This adds to the ‘split personality’ idea running through out this video.
During the second bridge of the song we see Rihanna sprawled on top of a male manikin whilst hugging caressing and seeming to whisper things into it’s ear as if it is a real person. Shortly following this we see a spider craw across the screen followed by Rihanna in a web like costume with spiders attached to her hair and body whilst she sings in the back ground “am I scaring you now?” this adds to the fear factor of the video showing that she is not a little girl who is squeamish of spiders, she wants to shock and scare her audience. When we hear “release me from this curse I’m in” we see Rihanna chained to a chair, the pace of the song slows slightly this is were more voyeuristic shots are used close ups of her lips, legs and high heels the sells her sex appeal making her seem ‘kinky’ with hand cuffs on appealing to a male audience. The video comes to a finally with an almost ‘summary’ of the hole
video with flashes of all the different scenes and edits used through out. The video through out is all dark with the occasional white or red lighting. The official music video had been viewed over 40 million times on YouTube on the 20th September 2009 proving how successful the video was and still is.
By Georgina Pollard