The start of the video is very graphic and show women hanging from their necks like pieces of meat, a very strong and sexual image to start of the video and sets the tone for the entire video a small focus is drawn to the women’s shoes hanging from the floor then the head showing she is fully hung form the floor it then cuts off to the title and the songs beats and lyrics begin
The song begins with artist rick room sat on a somewhat thrown looking chair with the women hanging around him he is depicted as a powerful yet mysterious person in the video. From what i can perceive of the way rick ross is portrayed a slight B.I.G emulation is being portrayed by him at this particular moment dress in red to symbolise power and danger and 0in a black room his position is of great power and mystery.
The second artist we see is kanye west himself and he is reciting the chorus of the song, stood in front of a lavish gold gate we notice hands trying to claw him back through the gate more notably female hands this is maybe to emphasize his female appeal or to show his distance with women a very unclear subject as of 2011 kanye has not only lost his long term girlfriend but also his mother so the degrading of women does fit a theme in his current reality of life. The nails are painted red to connate lust and danger also and a close up of his teeth show us the gold implant he had this also shows us his wealth. Later on we se kanye in a lavish bed with two females, his power and authority being shown by how the females are controlled by him as the sit in a lifeless manner on his bed dressed in all black to ad mystery to his character. Throughout the whole video we see the representation of women as objects very apparent.
Jay-z is the next artist to be shown in the video dressed in all black as well and looking very powerful his actions and stance is of great power the back is a woman again naked and dead on a coach he is seen to be very high up and wealth. The only female in the video with any power in nicki minaj but her whole power is given to her through her sexual appeal which makes you question whether she has any power at all we see a dark nicki teasing and taunting an innocent dressed in white nicki which them makes us question whether without the sexualisation would she be give such a powerful role in the video amongst such powerful men.
The ideas behind the music video is one of many to question some would see it as an attempt to be brash and controversial in the wake of an album release some would speculate that its the typical degrading of women “video vixens” that hip-hop has come to see and some would see this as an attempt to reclaim hip hop and make it an art again. With the mist of Michael Jacksons thriller in this video i can see it as an attempt to be artistically controversial in a sense that the video fits the lyrics of the song, the degrading of women goes with the mood kanye west has towards them throughout the whole of the album that they are in fact objects and his front cover that was banded justifies that to an extent the conventions remain unclear to me but the focus point of the entire video is in fact the women and the power men have over them
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