Rest assured, all: I’ll spare you the inevitable eyerolling from hearing yet another “SHINee’s Back” pun in regard to
SHINee‘s
recent return to the Korean music scene. In all honesty, it doesn’t
feel as if SHINee’s been away for all that long; they were still making
variety show appearances as a group in mid-August of last year, and
they’ve been extremely active in Japan. Three new singles and an arena
tour within the past year is nothing to sneeze at, so there certainly
hasn’t been a shortage of new material from them.
Nevertheless, SHINee is indeed back. Their return to Korea has been
met with quite a bit of fanfare; they’re currently being featured in
their own variety show, and the fact that
Dream Girl
is a full-length album and is thus due for some heavy-duty promotions
probably means that the group has a ton of variety show appearances
lined up ahead of them. More than that, however, the music video for
Dream Girl
— arguably the centerpiece of this round of promotions — is pleasantly
surprising in its cohesiveness, creativity, and in all the attention
paid to detail. And make no mistake: this is still an SM-produced music
video we’re talking about here. “Creativity” and “SM-produced music
video” — who’da thunk it?
In all seriousness, “Dream Girl” shows some of the most mature work
that both SHINee and SM’s production team has done so far. Don’t be
fooled by the array of rainbow colors and obligatory cute faces in the
music video. The “Dream Girl” MV is perhaps one of the first times SM
has managed to successfully create an “idol MV” without compromising
artistic quality — a task that is a lot trickier than one might think.
The running complaint about SM’s music videos is that they’re
formulaic, and obviously so: two box-like sets, close-up shots of each
member,
maybe a storyline sequence…but only if you’re lucky.
All of SM’s videos have been produced in an identical fashion since the
beginning of time (H.O.T.’s “
We Are The Future,”
anyone?) with very few exceptions. Understandably, SM videos have
earned a reputation of being painfully unoriginal and boring to watch.
Even the most defensive fans of SM groups seem to have a difficult time
defending the quality of these videos; many join along with the chorus
of dissenters bemoaning the loss of another potentially enjoyable MV to
yet another instance of “dancing in a box.”
So
what makes the “Dream Girl” MV so different? The formula is still the
same, and SM’s stylistic fingerprints are still all over this MV. But
let’s assume for a moment that there’s this mystical Music Video
Rulebook hidden somewhere in
Lee Soo-man‘s desk, and every music video produced under SM has to follow a very strict checklist as dictated by this rulebook:
- The opening shot needs to contain all of the group members in full view.
- Close-up shots of every member.
- At least two different, contrasting full shots of the entire group doing the choreography
- If you can fit anything else into the video after everything above has already been established, then go ahead. And good luck.
Good luck, indeed. Just from looking at SM’s music video backlog, one
can guess that it’s probably a lot harder than it looks to expand a
music video beyond the essentials. Why? Well, it doesn’t seem that too
many people have really tried to do so. But at the same time, it hasn’t
really been necessary to expand beyond the essentials because SM does
the essentials so well. The solo shots are always crisp and
well-composed, the choreography is captured extremely well, and the
lipsynching in the solo shots look natural and convincing. This is
oftentimes a lot harder than it looks; such a formulaic and clean-cut
approach to shooting means that the producers don’t have much “filler”
to work with and thus have to take extra care in ensuring that every
shot is flawless in its simplicity. I think these are things that we as
fans oftentimes take for granted; as boring as SM might be in producing
their music videos, they certainly have the basics down pat and they
execute them better than most other K-pop production companies out
there.
It takes a lot of work just to get the basics down, which is exactly
why the “Dream Girl” music video is so impressive. Upon first look, it’s
apparent that the video doesn’t have the same obvious, formulaic feel
as SM’s other videos. There’s a natural flow in its movement that
immerses the viewer into the video and makes it exciting to watch. The
“Dream Girl” MV is a very involved and very captivating piece of
cinematography — and yet, it doesn’t stray from that same essential
formula exhibited in all of SM’s other music videos.
The reason why “Dream Girl” is so good is because it retains the
cleanness and precision of that essential formula while filling every
remaining nook and cranny of the video with unabashed artistry. You see
this through the liberties taken with the solo shots — placing the
members off-center of the shot, challenging spacial perception through
the trampoline “dream” sequences, diversifying camera angles with the
bed shots, and so on. The sets are giant optical illusions that require
skilled camerawork in order to capture properly, and the color palette
throughout the video is just nuts: obviously there are tons of bright
colors, but they’re also contrasted by sleek greys and blues, muted
maroons and greens, and even a freaking
hot pink wall in some of the larger sets.
The
editing of the video, though, is what really sold me. Perhaps the
biggest reason why SM videos are so boring is because the cuts between
shots are done arbitrarily without much heed taken to the pacing and the
beat of the music. Half of the reason why this music video does such a
good job of sucking the viewer in is because the cuts are perfectly
timed with the music, to the point where it almost seems as if the video
is making the music. (If you don’t know what I mean, watch the MV again
while keeping that phrase in mind. Your universe will be thoroughly
rocked.)
And the colorful static blips — though not the easiest things on the
eyes — do a great job of tying the video together and keeping the viewer
on his/her toes. It’s the perfect testament to the amount of
painstaking detail involved in the making of this video. All in all, the
“Dream Girl” MV is a visual playground that only works as well as it
does because of the level of careful attention paid to detail.
This video was extremely ballsy, and there were so many places where
things could have easily clashed and gone haywire. But in the end, all
of it
worked, and it’s no doubt due to the fact that a) believe
it or not, SM’s creative staff are actually creative and know how to do
their jobs, and b) the “essential formula” is still the backbone of the
video.
Let’s get one thing straight: all K-pop idol music videos share one
very important unique trait in that their two main objectives are 1) to
make the idols look as good as possible, and 2) to make the choreography
look as good as possible. When one considers the nature of idoldom,
it’s easy to understand why this makes sense. SM’s music video formula
is centered around these two objectives, so when a video is produced
with
only those two objectives in mind and nothing else, it’s
easy to write it off as being a boring video whose sole purpose is just
to pander to the fangirls. But at the same time, these two objectives
serve an important role in keeping the video structured, focused, and
clean. The main point of the solo shots is the idol’s face. The main
point of the group shot is the choreography. These are two things that
can constantly draw the viewer back into the video and create a sense of
focus that helps keeps the viewer engaged. Of course, if your entire
video only consists of those two things (as most SM videos do), you’re
going to wind up with a painfully boring video. But if your video
doesn’t have a single anchor point like a solo shot or a dance shot and
consists solely of different storylines or wide-angle shots with lots of
movement or what-have-you, then you run the risk of confusing and
overwhelming the viewer.
SM has mastered the art of the idol music video, but this is the
first time they’ve made significant strides in expanding beyond their
strengths in an artistic manner. The result of it is perhaps SM’s
strongest music video to date.
I’ll
admit that I’m not a huge fan of “Dream Girl” as a song; it has a great
beat but it’s super, super corny and kind of repetitive. In this
regard, credit is due to the SHINee members for being able to sell a
song as corny as “Dream Girl” in such a convincing manner. The members
have really grown into their big-kid shoes within the last five years;
one look at their “
Replay”
video really shows how distracting it can be to watch a video where the
performers aren’t experienced enough to know how to fully blend
themselves into the song and the visuals of the video. The SHINee
members are completely convincing in “Dream Girl;” they are able to
grasp the zanyness of the video and move with it in perfect sync. The
partnership between the SHINee members and the music video (if a music
video can be regarded as a separate, living entity) is seamless and
perfectly synergetic.
The only complaint I have about the video is the random cuts to the
shot of the members’ faces divided across five vertical panels.
Conveniently, that shot usually accompanies the super-cheesy “
Dream girl!”
hook of the chorus. That particular shot really irritates me because
it’s so out-of-line with the rest of the video and breaks up the flow.
Then again, it only appears a handful of times so there’s still not that
much room to complain.
All in all, I really couldn’t ask for more in a K-pop music video. I
have a soft spot for “idol videos” if only because their simplicity is
so difficult to pull off in a clean and convincing manner. SM has always
done a great job of this, which is why I generally don’t complain about
idols “dancing in a box” because dancing in a box is really just
another way to show off the idols doing what they do best. Thus, a music
video like “Dream Girl” that takes artistic liberties while retaining
the basics is pretty much K-pop gold. In particular, it makes me really
excited to see what SM might have in store for future music videos
considering how far they were willing to stretch for “Dream Girl.” Of
course, it’s important to note that SHINee is currently SM’s least
risk-prone male group at the moment (in that SM is far less likely to
take any artistic chances on DBSK or Super Junior because of their
longer-lived and thus more “brittle” position in the industry), which is
perhaps why SM is comfortable taking such big chances with SHINee’s
material. It’s also probably why SM is so willing to invest so much
energy in ironing out the details in SHINee’s material.
While it’s not to say that all of SHINee’s releases are masterful
pieces of art (the “Dream Girl” album for one, is not), the fact that so
much attention was spent on something as menial as a music video gives
me hope. And even if the “Dream Girl” MV is a freak occurrence, and even
if we go back to seeing boring, formulaic music videos next month…well,
at least the “Dream Girl” MV will still be around to serve as proof
that an SM video can go far, far beyond the box.
Rating: 4.8/5
(SMTOWN; images via SM Entertainment)
cr: seoulbeats
TRANS:
![[Trans] Lovely Jonghyun me2day update 130222 -
Now watch music bank on time!!!
Credit : SHINeeme2day
Translation credit :Forever_SHINee [1]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_t_gKlMpZxXrpnydiolbX9xxayuhd4NQ3iO45-7q1pwLq9vICRm_Q7GYHR3mBz22WpMIwjImyZtVVdEkPYYzQoO7QfaMsruMNtEMwx3U75NNarP9uGwz0WKKHy674VZYCDd7Yx2atmnwVThoL_bJUlmNJRU-LJVmZkQQ9c-eR4cfgs=s0-d)
