The video essay “Dust Off” effectively made me very uncomfortable, which was my first reaction and feeling while watching it. While the music influenced this, it was hugely the visuals as well, which I admit I didn’t quite understand why some were used at certain times.
The third part stood out to me most at 4:00 with the jellyfish. This part was on a boy who died of erotic asphyxiation, and the underwater shots made me think of suffocation and darkness. The content of what she was talking about was eerie enough, but the visuals showed another side to what she was saying–how the boy felt. She didn’t say what it felt like when he died, or how he was feeling–just the facts of how it all went down. The underwater visuals showed a suffocating and trapped feeling, the jellyfish signaling your brain to think of “danger” in something that looks creepy and unsafe and that can hurt you.
That followed by the ending scene (which was used as the same clip to open the video essay) really brought the entire video full circle. It shows three toddler swings in the park–one for each boy who died. They’re covered in snow. Without having to say it, these swings make the viewer think of childhood and innocence. Without needing to say it, the viewer is made to understand that the boys who died were just children. The swings in the snow show the loss of innocence and death, often associated with snow and winter.
The video essay uses visuals to show what isn’t being said, and to give the viewer a feeling while listening to her words. The feeling is uncomfortable and strange, making the viewer uneasy to show what isn’t being said. What’s being said are facts–the visuals and music show the real feelings of these stories, just how messed up and uncomfortable and tragic they really are.