This 1983 video starts with a woman sat at the table, cracking eggs into a bowl. We can see immediately by her dress - she wears a floral top with an apron, that she is supposed to portray a housewife. She keeps looking at her watch. As the song starts, we have a really interesting shot of a woman moving right to left down a brick alley. This shot is heavily edited and a complete contrast to the previous shot of the woman in the kitchen. As the riff of the song begins, the camera cuts to an establishing shot of a street and we see a woman dancing down the street, interspersed with shots of the woman in the kitchen still cracking eggs.
The song is obviously of a narrative style; the lyrics start "I come home in the morning light" and we see Cyndi - who had previously been dancing manically down the street, dressed in party clothes - enter the kitchen where the woman cracking the eggs is. It becomes obvious as their interactions are shown that these two are meant to represent mother and daughter, and that the mother has been waiting for Cyndi to return from a night out. Interestingly, both Cyndi and her mother character say the lines that her mother says according to the song, a lovely touch, I think, that makes is an interesting way of representing the lyrics.
In the musical interlude, Cyndi once again dances in a rather odd style down the corridor, and we can see that the house is meant to represent something in the 80s, thus fitting completely with the time that it was recorded and released. As the second verse starts - with the lines "the phone rings" - we see a hand reaching for the phone, being stopped by a male's hand catching the wrist. We have something very similar to the first verse, where the father character says the words that the lyrics tell him to be saying to her. We have a sense of conflict throughout this video, with Cyndi's parents being obviously annoyed and frustrated that all their daughter wants to do is "have fun" rather than take anything in her life seriously.
The next sequence of shots sees Cyndi picking up the phone to her friend, and we have a sort of mock American sitcom style representation of the phonecall. Cyndi is shown in a small circle at the bottom right hand corner of the screen, whereas he friend is seen in large in the shot. This idea is interesting, and actually depicts teenagers very well, just by having the shot in this way. Each of the shots in this sequence is similar, each one of a different girl with Cyndi still singing down the phone at them whilst they chat, and in some cases, drink down the phone. After we have had individual shots of each of these girls, we have group shot of the 9 of them - including Cyndi - singing the lines "girls we want, we wanna have fun", moving in time with each other, swaying side to side.
We next have a really interseting shot, where the shot morphs into a sphere in the centre of the screen, revealing a green background and multicoloured circles around the edges of the shot. Again, this shot implies a sort of youthful idea, and is fun to look at in itself. The circle in the middle is then split up and brought back together again, with more shots of the same thing becoming small spheres around the outside of the shot. This is then cleverly edited into a polka dot style, which then becomes a bag of some sort that Cyndi holds in front of the camera and then moves as she begins to sing again - all very very clever editing.
Next, we see Cyndi watching television, and the video goes into the black and white film, showing a man picking up a girl and "hiding her from the rest of the world", another fun idea. We then have a CU of Cyndi's face, creating an intimacy with the viewer. We then have shots of the girls already previously shown in the video putting on their sunglasses, interspersed with shots of the 9 of them swaying from side to side, creating the idea of friendship and similarity - "girls just want to have fun". Some of these shots are flipped - again using the idea of fun editing to make a fun video.
We then see the girls - led by Cyndi - dancing down the street singing, as crowds line the street to watch. We seet he girls in various different settings, dancing around, creating a youthful feeling for the viewer. The crowds then join in the gentle dance through the streets, interspersed with shots of Cyndi's mother and father at home. The crowd then dances through the kitchen, much to the shock of the parents and into her bedroom.
We are then introduced to a man in a suit holding flowers. We can't hear him, but he seems to be shouting the word 'Cyndi', obviously looking for the singer. He finds her and kisses her, just as Cyndi's parents look through the keyhole to her bedroom and see. The crowd then fall out of the door and on top of her father, again, something very comical that adds to the fun of this video.
So, what makes this a great video?
- everything - editing, storyline etc - adds to makes this a fun video
- it's very funny
- captures the idea of youth and "girls just wanting to have fun"
- feel good
Next, we see Cyndi watching television, and the video goes into the black and white film, showing a man picking up a girl and "hiding her from the rest of the world", another fun idea. We then have a CU of Cyndi's face, creating an intimacy with the viewer. We then have shots of the girls already previously shown in the video putting on their sunglasses, interspersed with shots of the 9 of them swaying from side to side, creating the idea of friendship and similarity - "girls just want to have fun". Some of these shots are flipped - again using the idea of fun editing to make a fun video.
We then see the girls - led by Cyndi - dancing down the street singing, as crowds line the street to watch. We seet he girls in various different settings, dancing around, creating a youthful feeling for the viewer. The crowds then join in the gentle dance through the streets, interspersed with shots of Cyndi's mother and father at home. The crowd then dances through the kitchen, much to the shock of the parents and into her bedroom.
We are then introduced to a man in a suit holding flowers. We can't hear him, but he seems to be shouting the word 'Cyndi', obviously looking for the singer. He finds her and kisses her, just as Cyndi's parents look through the keyhole to her bedroom and see. The crowd then fall out of the door and on top of her father, again, something very comical that adds to the fun of this video.
So, what makes this a great video?
- everything - editing, storyline etc - adds to makes this a fun video
- it's very funny
- captures the idea of youth and "girls just wanting to have fun"
- feel good
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