Textual Analysis of an Iconic Music Video

Duran Duran - Hungry Like the Wolf

        

This video was so iconic, 'Hungry Like the Wolf' won Duran Duran international fame by helping them break into the US market. It was directed by Russell Mulcahy and was filmed in the jungles of Sri Lanka, giving it an unmistakably 'Indiana Jones' vibe. 

                     

The band help to promote the inter-textual references to 'Indiana Jones'- one of Goodwin's Conventions- by dressing Simon Le Bon in the famous sable fedora and with a similar colour scheme to Indiana Jones' outfits. Furthermore, the establishing shots and quick scene transitions of marketplaces and jungles help to further establish the relationship between Duran Duran and Indiana Jones through the mise-en-scene.

Duran Duran:

Indiana Jones:

Another inter-textual reference is to the popular apocalyptic film 'Apocalypse Now', in which there is a famous scene where Martin Sheen rises out of the water. Duran Duran mirrors this, with a close-up of Simon Le Bon rising out of a lagoon.

                         

                         

Furthermore, another of Goodwin's conventions of music videos displayed in Duran Duran's 'Hungry Like the Wolf' is the voyeuristic treatment of women. Aside from the fact that using a person of colour as the main love interest in a video about animalistic tendencies is racist, there is a scene where Simon Le Bon and Bermudian model Sheila Ming are chasing each other in a jungle, which is made very sexually suggestive by the use of fast-paced camera shots and the music becoming more centered on the instruments.


                         

Simon Le Bon- the lead singer- is featured more in this video than the rest of the band, because by now he is the band's iconography. An audience are encouraged to listen to Duran Duran because Simon Le Bon was viewed as attractive by an 80s audience. This is another one of Goodwin's Conventions of Music Videos, similarly to a relationship between lyrics and the video. For this, Duran Duran have used their lyrics to invoke a scene change. 

At the start of the video, they say "dark in the city", just as the scene is revealed to be a bustling city.


                         

On the next verse they sing "stalked in the forest", and the scene switches to a jungle scene with lush natural images.

                         

In conclusion, Duran Duran's 'Hungry Like the Wolf' displays several conventions of Goodwin's Music Video Conventions, clearly following these music video rules.