Music Video Analysis- Pussycat Dolls

Pussycat Dolls- When I Grow Up

The group includes five girls, and their image is to be very sexy, skinny and pretty. They are a very popular pop/RnB band.

Their image portrays woman being skinny and pretty and caring a lot about the way they are seen. The reason this is their image is because this is what a lot of people want to be like, and will therefore like them. This look is achieved by the members wearing very tight clothes and showing themselves off to the camera.

The bands most obvious target audience is teenage girls. They appeal to them because the way they look is how a lot of teenage girls want to look, as well as sing and dance like. Another target audience would be a varied age of men. I can tell this because the girls are all pretty and show off their bodies and a lot of men would like to watch this.

The video starts with all five girls sitting in a car. The camera pans around the car to set the scene, weaving in and out of the car. The camera zooms in on the different girls with extreme close ups on their faces, especially focusing on the lead singer. As John Stewart said a music video has the aesthetics of a TV commercial, with lots of close ups on the stars face.

The members are performing to the camera, acting as if they know it is there. As they are sitting in the car you can’t see their clothing very clearly at this point but they are all wearing very tight and revealing clothes, which adds to their sexy image. After this the girls get out and are dancing around on other cars. The camera is always moving and panning around to add excitement to the video. The girls are all dancing to the song, some parts as a routine all in sync to the music and some moves are different for each girl, for example rolling around on a car to show off their body. Some of the dance moves also match the lyrics. The whole video is made of quick cuts, from one singer to the next.

The next scene the girls are walking along, sometimes with the camera tracking along beside them and other times with a high angle or low angle shot, the girls are often looking directly at the camera to show they are singing to their audience. When they are walking along men and passersby turn their heads to look at them, this is the statement image they want to portray. This clearly portrays Andrew Goodwin’s theory that female performers are often objectified principally for display purposes.

The next part of the video the girls are climbing up scaffolding, whilst showing off their bodies. The shot switches from a birds eye view watching them climb up to a mid shot of them all together.

There are a lot of quick cuts in this shot, from extreme close ups of their faces and body parts to a long shot of them all dancing then a bird’s eye shot from above.

The last scene is of them all dancing on a movies set, which is actually the first part of the video which gives meaning to main lyrics: ‘When i grow up, i wanna famous, I wanna be a star, I wanna be in movies’. There is a Pussycat dolls sign behind them which is made to look like the Hollywood sign, which adds to the being famous look of the lyrics. There are also a lot of flashing lights to look like photographers. Most of the shots here are long or mid shots, as to emphasise the dance moves, which are all perfectly in time with eachother and the music.

I think the main aim of this music video is to promote the band image of a sexy group of girls, rather than tell a story or promote their music as such.