Textual Analysis: Fatboy Slim 'Weapon of Choice'

I have chosen Fatboy Slim's video of his well renowned song 'Weapon of Choice', the video features actor Christopher Walken dancing and flying around a deserted Marriot hotel in Los Angles.

The video was directed by Spike Jonez in 2000 when they hired the Marriot hotel in Los Angeles and got actor Christopher Walken, who was a trained dancer before he started his acting career, to dance around the silent hotel to the music. The video won six MTV music awards back in 2001, Walken was also awarded one of MTV's awards for best choreography. This video was also ranked number one in a list of top 100 music videos by VH1in april 2002. The type of genre this music is electronic dance, it has fast paced BPM that people can dance to hence the narrative by Christopher Walken, our song that we are planning on using is going to be electronic dance so this video is most appropriate with the random, spontaneous sort of performance.

The video starts with Walken Sitting in an arm chair in the hotel, wearing a formal attire and looking very glum and as if he waiting for something or someone, the music then proceeds to be played and Walken twitches, looks up and around at a cleaning cart and back towards the camera, the firm camera shot from the tripod helps to emphasise the dullness of his look, the video is also tone mapped to give it a sepia look to the short film.

The music then starts to pick up a little and Walken then stands up out of his chair, then all of a sudden he then springs into action with the music, his footsteps are choreographed to the beat of the music.

Walken dances over to the huge doors and the open simultaneously to his gesture, he prances through them rings the bell which is a different shot to the rest of the video as its a medium close up showing the bell and him hitting it to emphasise the noise, he dances back through and proceeds to jump onto a luggage cart, spins on it and jump off, all of which is filmed as a medium long shot on a steadi-cam to take away the noticeability of the handheld camera work.

Walken encounters the escalator next as he jumps onto the steps and 'grooves' to the beat, moving his top half of his body to the music, the camera tracks towards him and onto the escalator then back down as he runs back past the camera in a rush, the next shot is a medium long shot, tracking Walken from his right hand side as he prances down the corridoor, each leap that he takes is exactly in time with the music and then at the end he does a somersault to finish it off, he then pops his head up in time with the beat.

 He then continues to leap around the hotel until he reaches a table that he jumps up onto, kicks the papers and magazines that are on the table off and starts tap dancing during the breakdown of the song, this shot unlike most of the others is a fixated shot from a camera on a tripod, the gradual zoom of the camera gets us prepared and builds us up to the part of the song.

The lyrics to the song is as follows

Don't be shocked by the tone of my voice
Check out my new weapon, weapon of choice

Don't be shocked by the tone of my voice
Check out my new weapon, weapon of choice

Listen to the sound of my voice
You can check it all out, it's the weapon of choice

Don't be shocked by the tone of my voice
It's the new weapon, weapon of choice

[2x Chorus:]
You can go with this,
Or you can go with that,
You can go with this,
Or you can go with that,
You can go with this,
Or you can go with that,
Or you can throw with (us) [only the 1st time]

Walk without rhythm 
it won't attrack the worm

Walk without rhythm 
and it won't attrack the worm

Walk without rhythm 
and it won't attrack the worm

If you walk without rhythm
ah, you never learn

Don't be shocked by the tone of my voice
Check out my new weapon, weapon of choice

Don't be shocked by the tone of my voice
Check out my new weapon, weapon of choice

Be careful, we don't know them 
Be careful, we don't know them 
Be careful, we don't know them 

[2x Chorus]

Organically grown, through the hemisphere I roam
Too big love to the angels of light
Yeah, and my girl

She just don't understand
is gone beyond being a man

As I drift off into the night, I'm in flight
She's a Boy scout no doubt
but I'm going to hold my cool, 
because of easy rules

Yeah, so move on baby, yeah

Halfway between the gutter and the stars, yeah
Halfway between the gutter and the stars, yeah

[2x Chorus]

The lyrics of the song are minimal and simple but effective, in the first verse it suggests that he is different to what you can see.

The next part of the song is where Walken dives over one of the balconies in the building, to our surprise in the next shot we see him flying around the building.

By using Christopher Walken in the video, it is the unique selling point that the record label have tried to go with, if you know Walken you will know that he would usually play a very serious role in the films that he has starred in, this means that they have taken what he is typically known for and turned it upside down and little do people know that Walken is a trained dancer and choreographer which adds to the effect. At the time of filming this video Walken was 58 years old, to see a 58 year old man running, dancing and flying around an deserted classy hotel is a strange and bizarre sight to say the least, but with the strange, random style of video comes a the people that want to see something different and just out of the ordinary which is where this video excels.

Using Walken as the main star, creates a seriousness about the video as soon as you see him, in the start, he is sitting in the chair looking clam and serious but soon after he springs into action when the music is playing, this really gives off the vibe of 'Theres more than what meets the eye'.

Other videos that british musician Fatboy Slim has released are just as strange and bizarre as this one, the video to the song 'Praise you' directed by Spike Jonez again is an amatuer hand held camera based video, also known as gurilla style (shot on location without obtaining permission from the owners of the building) of a dance routine that is performed outside of a typical American movie theatre, puzzled onlookers watch in shock and disbelief that its really happening.

The video cross promotes Walkens image, it shows him in a different light compared to how we would usually see him, this shows him doing something completely out of the blue and random.

I really like the concept behind this video, to me Jonze has taken someone that we all know and see as a serious figure in the film industry and put him in a strange, bizarre scenario that we never new could be done, the lyrics are soft and subtle but make the overall video slightly more strange, 'Dont be shocked by the tone of my voice, check out my weapon, weapon of choice'  is a key line in the chorus that structures the video. The style of video is great and i would look into doing it in my final video, i like the spontaneous, juxtaposition of the scenario and the way in which its filmed, on a steadi-cam mostly.