Watch the brand new video from Lizzie Marvelly for her new single My Own Hero. Here, video director Shae Sterling shares the creative process he and Marvelly went through to make it.
"When I first sat down with Lizzie to discuss the My Own Hero music video she had some
very strong ideas about the themes of the song, but we both felt that the video could take any number of different paths. My Own Hero is all about empowerment, saving yourself, overcoming. We wanted the video to reflect those themes and also to take fans on a journey.
"I wanted to create something exciting that invoked some of the feelings from the lyrics. I wanted to tell the story of two different women in different times facing their own challenges. I had an image of a women trapped in an abusive marriage, in a grand old house, perhaps late 1800s.
"My girlfriend had a dream about an old house she visited as a child. This turned out to be Mansion House on Kawau Island which was perfect and became the base point for our story.
"In the story, modern day Lizzie finds and old song book with musical notation. She sees in the book the song My Own Hero and a picture of an old house. She begins to play the song on the piano and imagines a story of who could have written this and what it could have been about. She imagines herself in this story.
"We planned to film all the 1800s parts in one day, and we had a great morning at Mansion House, which is a fantastic location, full of character. I just had to be mindful about editing out lots of modern things like signs posts, sprinklers, light switches etc anything that wasn't relevant to the period.
"Unfortunately, in the afternoon it bucketed down. We spent two hours trying to wait for the weather to clear as there's a part where Lizzie needs to ride a horses on the beach. Obviously it was important she could do this without breaking her neck or us breaking a camera, but the rain really set in, so we had to flag it. This actually turned out to be an advantage as it gave us more time to get great shots the next day.
"It was great to see Lizzie acting as well as singing and for her to delve into two contrasting characters; turns out she's talented in a few areas, including riding a horse! Although she wasn't taken with the idea of galloping bareback and helmet-less down a stormy beach so we asked Karen, who worked at the stables, who fortunately looked a lot like Lizzie, to be a body double for the bit where she canters away.
"For modern Lizzie's story we filmed at City Dance. All of the choreography (both in the modern and eighteenth century scenes) was created by Ginny Scahill, and we shot all of the modern scenes in one afternoon.
"Both Lizzie and I were very aware about the wider connotations of having a fight scene in the video, but it felt true to the story and it subverted the damsel-in-distress paradigm where the damsel is rescued by some dashing hero on a white horse. We recognise it isn't always possible for women to get out of an abusive relationship. New Zealand's statistics of violence against women and children are frankly inexcusable. This song and video is a nod to that and a proclamation of hope that families currently affected by domestic violence can survive and overcome."
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