Katy Perry- Hot 'n Cold textual analysis, Hannah Stanton

I am analysing the music video Hot 'n cold by Katy Perry. The music video was directed by Alex Ferguson. The genre of this song is pop and the genre characteristics of the video are:

• There is a dance routine, this is where her and the brides maids perform a dance routine with bass ball bats.
• A performance of her singing the song on stage, with her dressed in red and wearing designer sunglasses. We know they are designer because the camera keeps doing close ups on the glasses.
• Katy is portrayed as 'quirky' and this is shown through random actions in the video. e.g. There's a man dressed as a hot dog and Katy appears with a zebra at the end of the video, this represents the concept of "hot 'n cold" because two opposites have been placed together.

The relationships between lyrics and visuals:

• She's singing certain words, and they relate to her actions e.g. shes says " you change your mind like a girl changes clothes" and she literally does change outfits throughout the video.
• This music video has a circular narrative because it starts and ends in the same place, in a church where they are about to get married.
• The storyline casts her at a wedding, about to exchange vows with her fiancee. He runs away at the altar before taking his vow, she follows him, and they appear to be playing a cat-and-mouse game. Katy and the dancers corner him several times, in different clothing. As she sings the song's verses to him, she appears alternately angry, and seductive. At the end of the video, it is revealed that the whole pursuit was Alexander's fantasy, and he is still standing at the altar while Katy waits for him to say "I do". He does, and the crowd in the church breaks out into cheers as Katy runs victoriously down the aisle with him. 
• In the middle of the video her dress is wrecked, makeup is running down her face and she is crying. She appears to be broken hearted and this represents her as a mess. Near the end she has got a new image with new clothes and makeup, and she appears to have a lot of confidence, this represents 'girl power' as she is now in control of the situation. The whole cat and mouse game is his vision of what will happen if he says no. 

The relationship between music and visuals:

• At the beginning everyone's moving to the beat of the music.
• Later on in the video it shows her on stage with her band, their playing and she's singing in time sync with the music, so this is a reference to the instruments used in the song. 
• Close ups of the artist's legs, lips, crotch and eyes persuade us to see her as a sex object.
• References to the notion of looking - see her talking/reflected in mobile phone all attention focused on her as the background is black.