- Agency: Cadence Films
- Client: Olivia Rodrigo
- Category: Video Design — Videos with Amazing Background Music
- Location: New York City, New York, United States
- Project Brief: Create a cinematic music video that captures the emotional intensity of young love through atmospheric visuals, intimate storytelling, and a compelling musical backdrop.
A video riding on amazing background music should show you a feeling the words can only point at. Olivia Rodrigo's "stupid song" pulls it off with a pack of pink ballerinas trailing her around the Upper West Side, turning a crush into something you can actually watch move.
The video design works because of how different she looks from them. Rodrigo slouches along in a dark blue hoodie and big buckled boots while the dancers float around her in soft pink tutus, and that gap, her guarded cool against all their spinning openness, is pretty much what a crush feels like.
The dancing comes from New York City Ballet's Tiler Peck, and it builds right along with the song. The ballerinas start out scattered on the sidewalk, then bunch up, pirouette, and by the end they are straight-up moshing, which follows the track sliding from holding back to just losing it completely.
Cadence Films let the light shift with her mood too, opening in a cold blue morning until the sun finally comes out and she pulls her hood down to run around with everyone. That move from closed-off to chaotic gives the whole feeling a shape you can follow, and it plays out on real New York streets instead of some built set.
