Festivids '14 - Nicki Minaj - The Girl You Like
Song: "Lookin' Ass Partition It Up" mashup by PEMiZovatiez with bridge of Dave Aude Partition remix
Vidder:
bananainpyjamas aka dragonchic
Fandom: Nicki Minaj music videos
Summary: Look at y'all lookin'. Made for
sol_se
Download:
97.7 MB 720p MP4
32.5 MB 480p AVI
Stream:
Vimeo (password: gaze)
YouTube (embedded below)
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Original Festivids Post
Tumblr
Click to view(All I know is there should be no reason)
Look at y'all n*****
(All I know is there should be no reason) x2
(All I know, you know, and you know it)
Yo, he don’t know me but he setting up to blow me, uh
Said my Twitter pics remind him of Naomi, uh
On the low I used to holla at his homie, uh
Fuck it, now I’m about to ride him like a pony, yeah
Okay, thug prolly, yo come polly
He wanna fuck a bad Dolly and pop Molly
I hope your pockets got a muthafuckin' pot belly
Or is it that you never ball? John Salley
He had the Rolls in his Royce, the tone in his voice
Don’t want a good girl, now hoes is his choice
D-D-Dick on H, pussy on W
Mouth on open, ass on smother you
Ass on the cover too, Elle Magazine
Vroom, vroom, vroom, get gasoline
Could I be your wife? Naw we could bang though
I got these n***** whipped - call me Django
Take all of me
I just wanna be the girl you like (girl you like)
The kinda girl you like (girl you like)
Is right here with me
Pour it up, pour it up
That's how we ball out
Est-ce que tu aimes le sexe?
Le sexe. Je veux dire, l'activité physique
Le coït. Tu aimes ça?
Tu ne t'intéresses pas au sexe?
Les hommes pensent que les féministes détestent le sexe
Mais c'est une activité très stimulante et naturelle que les femmes adorent
[English translation:]
Do you like sex?
Sex. I mean, the physical activity
Coitus. Do you like it?
You're not interested in sex?
Men think that feminists hate sex
But it's a very stimulating and natural activity that women love
All I see is signs
All I see is dollar signs
Take all of me
I just wanna be the girl you like (girl you like)
The kinda girl you like (girl you like)
Take all of me
I just wanna be the girl you like, girl you like
The kinda girl you like is right here with me
(All I know is there should be no reason)
Look at y'all n*****
(All I know is there should be no reason) x3
(All I know, you know, and you know it)
(Look at what, reason)
So, this vid was inspired by the debates I kept seeing around the internets about whether Nicki is empowered or exploited, which kicked into overdrive when the Anaconda video premiered. In the words of a wise taco commercial, "Why not both?" She plays up a hypersexualized image that panders to straight men, but she does so on her own terms and as a means to an end.
That's really all that needs to be said, but there's some extended rambling on the vid's structure/intent below. If you subscribe to the "author is dead" philosophy, turn back now!
...still reading? Alrighty. To put it simply, the vid is structured around implied power dynamics. I'm not going to argue Nicki is ever some kind of passive object, since anyone who follows her career knows that isn't the case. But there's a shift in the visible balance of power between Nicki and the men surrounding her as the vid goes on.
Specifically, we start out with typical club banger hip hop imagery. Nicki chooses to play the sex kitten and the men show off ostentatious signals of wealth and power. She's presenting herself in a way that's familiar and easily accepted by the target audience. There's also a brief romantic interlude in which she's less objectified but still playing into traditional ideas of what women want from men. The balance starts to shift in Nicki's favor over the bridge. She smacks away Drake's hand and then lets us know that women *gasp* actually like sex (though the hands/nails sequence in this section can be read as predatory...foreshadowing!). The last minute of the vid removes any ambiguity about who's calling the shots. Everything that came before was a means to an end ("all I see is dollar signs) and now it's her turn to show off wealth, power, and eye candy of her own choosing. This reversal is taken to the extreme with the violent imagery in the ending sequence, culminating in Nicki literally blowing away the male gaze at the end.
If it seems like the vid goes all over the damn place and almost contradicts itself, well, yeah. It's like Nicki in that respect. She's deft and unapologetic in the way she leverages her sexuality to acquire money and power in a male-dominated industry. But it's still a form of empowerment that panders to straight men. I mean, I don't think it's coincidental that she dials the sexiness up to 11 when she's a feature on a male artist's track. She always goes hard on her verse, but there's only so much she can do when the rest of the song is all "SHAWTY GOT A BIG OL' BUTT, OH YEAHHHH." So talking about exploitation vs. empowerment in either/or terms is a pretty shallow reading of the situation IMO.
But I'm sure plenty of people read the vid differently and I've never been one to call divergent audience interpretations invalid. I just typed all that out in case anyone was wondering about the thought process behind the vid. :)
To end things on a technical note, mixed aspect ratios and low-quality source are soooo aggravating. If you're familiar with the music videos you probably noticed the framing I used to mask the most problematic instances. Hopefully none of it was too jarring.
Enjoy! As always, any and all feedback is welcome.
Dreamwidth crosspost: http://bananainpyjamas.dreamwidth.org/1595.html