This video essay was first published in 2018 in NECSUS: European Journal of Media Studies, in a special audiovisual essay section edited by Miklos Kiss. It was made according to the following brief from Miklos:

“I aimed to inspire the making of videographic works that provide ‘straightforward close analyses of specific scenes of movies – […] focused, analytical, exploratory, and explanatory analyses that take advantage of the novel affordances of the audiovisual medium to clearly present, prove, and argue for their observations on a particular – perhaps key – moment of a film’. ” (full introduction here)

Through the performance of close reading in an audiovisual format, I was interested in exploring the possibilities of a ‘music-led’ explanatory analysis, in which the flow of the criticism is choreographed to the soundtrack it critiques.

This featured in the Sight & Sound poll for best video essays of 2018 and was screened and shortlisted for the 2019 Adelio Ferrero video essay award.