Take Me Out

The embed was "disabled by request" from youtube so heres the URL:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_9GR9kdZ3o

Franz Ferdinand – Take Me Out
Directed by: Jonas Odell
About 4 mins

“Take Me Out” is a music video that embraces short film and uses it to take their music to new levels of creativity. They incorporate influences from art movements such as Dada and Russian constructivist design in this video.
This approach was successful for the band because they used these styles of design to define themselves and as a result people remember this video or their CD covers for their quirky looks. They branded themselves to make their music go with this styles and it stuck.

In “Take Me Out,” film is mixed with animation to create a montage of images that have no narrative but a strong experimental feel. The images relate to the sounds of the music, for example the bass pounding is seen through the punching men or the repeated circles, the tapping skeleton legs and the transition of images. It is fast paced but keeps the audiences attention. Jonas Odell, the director of this video, really takes their style to the next level by incorporating it into this video. In some sense, I feel he should be credited with much of their success because of this video. To my knowledge most people recognize this video and at least when I think of Franz Ferdinand, I think of this particular song and the visuals that go along with it. It entertains me more than most videos and I think that’s because of the inventiveness of it. The constant changing of images keeps me focused and interested.

I think this video is important in the short film world because of the clear influences from the design movements that it is referencing. The cutout images and constant movement give the montage effect while the repeated sequences of interlocking red, black and white squares screams Russian constructivist if nothing else in the video does. These elements are seen in both forms of art (montage for example) and this video brings them together. The animation of images looks like a design you would see on a Russian poster in the 1920s –early 30s. Using film to represent these elements makes the style more modern without taking away from the older quality of images. For me the video “Take Me Out” shows how these design movements and film can be incorporated together successfully into a cohesive piece.