Analysing 'Like A Prayer'

Music videos are created in order to visualize the artist for the audience - to show what he/she looks like, their personalities and image, so that people can appeal to something material rather than just voice in the song.
'Like A Prayer' - is a song by Madonna, released in 1989.The clip for this song is one of the most controversial music videos of all time because it covers sensitive topics as religion and race. To be honest, most of the Madonna's music videos are quite controversial, which creates a certain type of image for her as an artist.

During the first 15 seconds of the clip we can see a shot of a burning crucifix, which on its own is an anti-Christian sign, but also, you may argue, it is a link to KKK. KKK - is an abbreviation of Ku Klux Klan, a secret organisation, which members were pro-segregation and were lynching black people back in the 50s before the success of the Civil Rights movement. As this is a part of the mise-en-scene it is known as 'symbolic genre convention'.

When Madonna comes into the church we can see that she is wearing a rather revealing outfit - a red dress with decollete, her lips are red and the hair is not tied up. However, she is still wearing a small crucifix on her neck, and this juxtaposition, arguably, was one of the main reasons to cause such controversy in the society about this music video.

Later on, she sees a Jesus trapped in the cage. The Jesus is black. This image of the black Jesus is quite unusual and not everybody sees it as a positive thing to show in the Britain - a country of white Christians.

Madonna sees Jesus crying, he 'becomes alive', and she lies down on the bench. In her 'dream' she is in the Heaven and is greeted by the black woman. The mise-en-scene and the character positioning connotes this black woman in a God. Again, this is very controversial - portraying a God not like a white man as it usually appears on the British TV, but as a black woman.

When Madonna comes back from 'Heaven' she releases Jesus from the cave into the church. This move may be interpreted in a quite symbolic way - Madonna kind of 'got the permission' from the God to release the Jesus.

After she released him - he is coming out of the church. Madonna picks up the knife, which Jesus was holding in his hand while was in the cage. She picks it up and accidentally cuts herself. When she looks at her hands - there is a stigmata. Stigmata -  is a term used by members of the Christian faith, which describes the body marks, sores, or sensations of pain in locations corresponding to the crucifixion wounds of Jesus Christ, such as the hands, wrists, and feet. This is an example of intertextuality - this symbolic convention (make-up) in this context refers back to the Bible and the crucifix.

In the next part we see the Madonna coming out of the church and seeing the woman getting attacked by the group of white men, which are portrayed as being criminals, violent and aggressive, which doesn't adhere to the stereotype of white men always being the heroes.

The group of white man stab the woman to death. When the black man appears and tries to help her - he is caught by the police. This is an example of racism in the police forces - the black man at the crime scene is treated like a criminal at the first glance, which is known as the racial profile.

After that Madonna is dancing in front of burning crosses, which links back to the KKK idea.

The scene where the black man is taken by the police is contrasted to the scene in the church - where Madonna is dancing with the God and other people, who came into the church.

There is also a very strange shot where the black Jesus and Madonna are kissing on the bench. This is really confusing in such religious context, to be honest))

The music video finishes with Madonna releasing the black man, who was wrongly accused for the murder, from the police office by convincing the policeman that he didn't do it. This refers back to the part when she released black Jesus from the cage in the church. 

The whole music video for 'Like A Prayer' :

By making such music videos there has been a certain image created around Madonna - people see her as rebellious, sexy freedom fighter, who can pretty much say and do whatever she wants in her songs and videos. The whole image of a 'star' is constructed for the audience for the marketing purposes, following the dominant ideology of the masses. 'Stars' are not real people, as well as such image of Madonna is not what she probably would be in the real life.

Richard Dyer in his theory claimed that stars are constructed out of range of materials like their appearance, artwork and music videos, with a great emphasis on the USP(unique selling point).

Star image = construction + commodity + ideology.

Dyer has come up with two paradoxes in his theory, which explain the success of artists like Madonna:

1) 'The star must be simultaneously ordinary and extraordinary for the consumer' - for example, Madonna sings about ordinary things that are close to everyone in some way or another, however, the way she acts in her music videos may be considered as 'deviant behaviour', not normal for ordinary people, which is attractive for her target audience.
2) 'The star must be simultaneously present and absent for the consumer' - for example, Madonna shares some interests of her audience (like she may visit some popular cafes, where her audience tend to go as well), but she also owns things and does things, which normal people cannot afford (like owing a really expensive car), which make them wanting to be 'like her' and therefore her image is 'sold' better.