Music Video Review: Happy By Pharrell

Happy is of a pop genre and the video is typically follows the basic conventions of a pop genre the artists and in this case other “performers” in this video are dressed in what I would call fashionable or stylish attire it can be also said that they are dressed in the mainstream outfits. Evidently portrayed by both the title of the song and the vibes coming from the video (pardon the pun) the video is a generally “happy” video and the characters seem to be enjoying themselves and generally seem more than content with life. In concern of the lyrics they are based on the loving nature of society rather than love in terms relationships. However in this video there is not a specific audience because of the nature of the song and its lyrics the message to the song can be applied to all ages whether it be children to teens or even adults as portrayed by the wide variety of the appearances by representatives of all the age groups there is a sense of unity in which is portrayed becomes it’s not age specific and neither is it gender specific.

Through the clothing used we can see that here is a positive vibe coming off as there are mainly bright colours used in this video there are blues yellows pinks and so on there are no colours that promote violence because even when there was red attire it was a very light red as opposed to a dark blood red. Colour symbolism is important in this video and there is a lot of it for example just looking at Pharrell if we take a closer look at the colours he is wearing there is a lot of bright colours for example he wears a lot of white in the video in the opening seen he is seen to be wearing white and white symbolises innocence, purity and simplicity and like the nature of the video portrays a very relaxed vibe. Then we have green and although it is a mild green jumper green represents life and growth hence why we can see all the different spectrums of life from children to adults. It represents the environment and can explain why there are many different locations seen in the video and finally it represents healing and through the lyrics we can see the healing nature of the song. The exuberance that is associated with the song and the feel good nature it has. Throughout the video we see Pharrell wearing black and most of the time it s to promote brands but black also represents elegance and power which is something that ties in well with the theme of the video. Black is not always a negative colour but that's not a conventional theme for pop videos so we have a little deterrence form the pop genre as usually its strictly bright colours.

Happy is a performance based video which means rather than telling at story we have a performance but in this case the term "performance" can be used loosely because its not like using actual performance rather than an many cameos from both famous and ordinary people showing the audience that you it doesn't matter whether you have celebrity status or not happiness is something that we can all have. throughout the vide we have people dancing walking and even riding bikes, in this case I do not think its scripted the performer just can and try to portray happiness the way they see it fit. The structure of the song is very simple and so its meaning because if you think about the line "room without a room" means there are no limits. A roofless room has no boundaries and there are not limits allowing your happiness to fly to unimaginable heights. It is unfortunate to think that some people do not know what makes them happy and the line "clap along if you know what happiness means you" is just meant to make you happy through the happy feel good song that it is.

In the video the only shots we really see are long shots and this is for a number of reasons. First of all in the video the performers are either dancing or walking or interpreting their vision of happiness in some shape or form so using close shots would not demonstrate and show what they are doing effectively. There are a few medium shots but these are very rare but it is his video so these shots are usually promoting a brand of clothing; or to show of his signature hat.  The editing is effective because it usually follows the beat of the song so it is in sync with the video. The shot only change when the is a change in the beat of the song. In terms of lip syncing the characters on really do this when it is the chorus or on one of the more popular lines and that's it but obviously Pharrell lip syncs the verses and then on the chorus its usually other people.