A dark room is brightened from the back with lamps and a projector rolling home videos of Marshall’s family on a white wall. As the clicking of the tapes continue, music comes in with a familiar beat known to most as Eminem’s “Mockingbird.” In this music video for one of his most famous songs, Mathers watches short films from when his daughters were growing up while the camera pans to him sitting in his office chair with a serious, but caring look on his face.
This back and forth between him and the films continue throughout the entire video. He uses this format to sadden the audience of the video, therefore, the audience, which consists of traditional rap fans especially those who have kids, will understand the depression he went through as he tried to grow his career and shelter his family all at once from all the bad things that were happening around them. Eminem uses rhetoric to employ emotional appeals to the audience, he also establishes his credibility as a loving father to his daughters. Eminem’s music video for “Mockingbird” is his most revealing and sentimental video because of the way he uses dark imagery and a serious tone to get across his message of how he is deeply sorry for what his daughters had to go through while growing up.
Bringing the audience’s feelings out after watching the video was an important factor when creating this piece. If the reader could take into consideration the hatred and physical depression that he was going through, that alone would be all it takes to understand how easily he takes advantage of the emotions of the audience. This is where Eminem decides to establish his pathos appeal to the congregation of the video. Holding a photo album titled, “Daddy’s Little Girls” he begins to open it and the book is covered with a picture of his daughters sitting together. Considering his initial message for the video, one can tell how much he appreciates and cares for his children. He claims on AZLyrics that this song was his, “most emotional song’ he has ever written (Eminem Lyrics.) This proves how his music video for “Mockingbird” is his most emotional one yet.
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Throughout his piece, Mathers uses several strong instances that strengthen his credibility and appeal to ethos. He chooses home videos to play that involved his daughters when they were younger as well as clips of his ex-wife, Kim Mathers, playing with the girls. He tries to establish his credibility as a true father figure to his daughters by using the song to explain to them why Kim disappeared. Eminem explains on AZLyrics how Kim “cut her tether off” in that she left him with the responsibility of raising the girls by himself (Eminem Lyrics.) In a lot of the clips he can be seen holding and cherishing them as they grow up becoming aware of their surroundings. Although he was not there throughout their entire life, he is using this video to prove his love for his children as well as establish his sincere apology to them. Taking care of his daughters’ feelings was very important to him especially to be a single parent at the time. He reveals to the audience his sentimental side in this song and video.
Along with his emotional appeals, Mathers uses his logos rhetoric to establish a serious tone with a dark sense of imagery. The video appears as a low budget production, and that adds to the gloomy and meaningful tone behind the face of Eminem. Marshall claims that he would do anything to, “keep his daughters happy and see them smile”(Eminem – Mockingbird.) Of course, that would include killing the mockingbird he bought for them in the song. He was going through a very hard time and used the song as a way to vent to others what he was dealing with.
Mathers shows a soft side that most rappers are too prideful to show, proving to others that regardless of his role he still has feelings and everyday life has ups and downs that still pertains to him. Also, that was one of the points he wanted to come across. His daughters play such a big part in his life and regardless of other reasons, he chose to write this so he could prove to them that even though he wasn’t always there for them, he never forgot them. In the end, Eminem wanted to bring out his serious life situations out and about. He did this by showing us dark colors and telling us about the problems society threw at him.
Shown clearly in Eminem’s “Mockingbird” he uses dark imagery and a serious tone to get his message across that he wishes he could have sheltered his daughters from what was going on around them as they grew up. Along with the use of sentimental home videos, Mathers focuses on his relationship with the two girls which brings out the emotions of the audience. His final product is a successful music video displaying his credibility with his girls as a father and a role model to fans. Maybe Eminem needed a change from all of the hardcore rap battling he had been doing so he could get to his roots and get some stuff off of his chest. Who knows, he could come out with another serious song and video for something that is hitting our society soon.
Works Cited
- “Eminem – Mockingbird (Lyrics Review and Song Meaning).” JustRandomThings, 17 Nov. 2018,http://justrandomthings.com/2017/09/27/eminem-mockingbird-lyrics-review-song-meaning.
- EminemMusic. “Eminem – Mockingbird.” YouTube, YouTube, 16 Nov. 2018, www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9bCLPwzSC0.
- “Mockingbird (Eminem Song).” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 15 Nov. 2018, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mockingbird_(Eminem_song).
- Resto, Luis, and Marshall Mathers. “Eminem Lyrics.” AZLyrics, 18 Nov. 2018 www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/eminem/mockingbird.html.
