Narrative Theory Applied to a Music Video

 The 1975 – Robbers The video for Robbers has an abstract like structure in the sense that many flashbacks are used, but overall seems to follow more of a narrative structure. The narrative is a recycled story of Bonnie and Clyde and follows a rebellious couple through their relationship, up until a point where they take a gun into a shop in an attempt to steal money. In relation to Kate Domaille’s theory, this would be classed as a Romeo and Juliet style narrative as opposed to her seven other options, due to their relationship status and the romantic aspect of it. In relation to Sven Carlsson, Robbers would be classed as a narrative video, as it is in the style of a short story and has a lack of lip-sync with no performance aspect. At one point the music itself actually stops in order for the narrative to follow through and allow the audience to hear a gunshot. Claude Levi-Strauss ‘s theory doesn’t apply completely to the video, apart from the slight use of good vs. evil, with the robbers and the shop assistant, who isn’t actually seen within the video. As mentioned before, the narrative is made up of a recycled story and therefore Michael Shore’s theory applies to this. The reference to Bonnie and Clyde links well to the song and creates a quirky scenario and video. Pam Cook’s theory is relevant to the Robbers music video, as it follows a specific narrative. The setting is in a fictional world (diegesis) which also contains verisimilitude and begins with equilibrium and follows with a quest, then ends with re-equilibrium.