I just saw the bombastic video for “Vida La Vida” by Coldplay and must say I am a bit disappointed, because I like the song a great deal and thought it deserved better. In fact, for the past month or so I have been constructing my own video for the song in my head (something I do quite often for a song I really love) and think, well, my version would have been miles better, even if it might have cost a touch more.
Music videos are tricky things. We live in a subtle age, in which art which is subtle seems to be the most valued. How this parses out in music videos is that it is generally uncool to simply represent the exact content of the words, especially in real time with the action immediately mirroring the last sung words (something the Chris Martin does in the new video quite often). Nevertheless, sometimes I think direct representations of some of the words in a song can be quite effective, particularly if these are nested in a story the video is telling.
First, for reference, here are the lyrics to “Viva La Vida:”
___________________
I used to rule the world
Seas would rise when I gave the word
Now in the morning I sleep alone
Sweep the streets I used to own
I used to roll the dice
Feel the fear in my enemy’s eyes
Listen as the crowd would sing:
“Now the old king is dead! Long live the king!”
One minute I held the key
Next the walls were closed on me
And I discovered that my castles stand
Upon pillars of salt, pillars of sand
I hear Jerusalem bells are ringing
Roman Cavalry choirs are singing
Be my mirror my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field
For some reason I can not explain
Once you go there was never, never an honest word
That was when I ruled the world
It was the wicked and wild wind
Blew down the doors to let me in.
Shattered windows and the sound of drums
People could not believe what I’d become
Revolutionaries Wait
For my head on a silver plate
Just a puppet on a lonely string
Oh who would ever want to be king?
I hear Jerusalem bells are ringing
Roman Cavalry choirs are singing
Be my mirror my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field
For some reason I can not explain
I know Saint Peter won’t call my name
Never an honest word
But that was when I ruled the world
(Ooooh Oooh Oooh)
Hear Jerusalem bells are ringing
Roman Cavalry choirs are singing
Be my mirror my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field
For some reason I can’t explain
I know Saint Peter will call my name
Never an honest word
But that was when I ruled the world
______________
First, in a nod to the end of the video for “Yellow” (a simply amazing video made more or less accidently) I would begin by having a blazing sun rising out of the sea, and then the camera would pan to the left during the opening music. The scene would be a hot Mediterranean morning with a hazy blue sea, and a dusty, sandy shoreline in the foreground. The shot would pan to a castle on the very edge of a cliff top, surrounded by a dusty, crowded city, but this would be seen from the distance. The camera would circle down to a hovel and shoot Martin in the hovel from the back, in silhouette against the sea, on a balcony, beginning to sing.
I am not sure of the sequence of these flashbacks but I would like these ones included.
Martin in a home with a regal interior with a Mediterranean (Greek, Turkish, or something like) woman. Some initial “in-loveness” scenes might be included, but there would need to be one scene of her trying to stop him from leaving as he dresses and arms himself, obviously on his way to start a revolution.
Somewhere we need a scene of the woman leaving, intercut with Martin becoming very severe and hard.
Then miscellaneous revolutionary, storming the castle scenes with Martin leading soldiers could be scene. Some of the other band mates can be his military cohorts. This might be followed by snippets of his reign of iron.
To depict his reign unraveling, a scene of him being chased through the castle by the band mates as former fellow soldiers, now revolutionaries would end with him being forced to and then off a precipice…you guessed it, into the sea. This could all happen during the Oooh, oooh, ooooh’s perhaps.
The flashback scenes would all be intercut with Martin as a humble cobbler, or whatever he is, wandering around the little hamlet where he lives, generally with obvious relief and joy on his face. Chris Marin can do some of his goofy dancing and gesturing here, but in a tasteful way. These sequences might also have a more serious scene where Martin walks sadly by a dusty church. At this point, perhaps the camera could zoom in on the face of a silent priest with piercing eyes who watches him as he walks by.
The video would end with the woman passing through the village (perhaps in a small entourage) and secretly recognizing him and staring at him and beginning to smile and him returning her gaze with serious/wistful/happy face. Then it would be back to the smile of the woman. You can’t go wrong ending a video with the smile of a beautiful woman. Perhaps she could be in front of the sea with the sun setting behind her (the castle and and city and village could all be on a narrow peninsula so it would make sense that the sun could rise and set in the same place) and we could pan out to the sun in a similar fashion to the way we began.
Well, that is what has been taking up some of my thought processes during my drives this month. The picture below taken in Chicago does not illustrate my video, but also reminded me of this song.