METTE - Mama's Eyes
Award: Yellow Pencil
Yellow Pencil / Editing / Long Form / 2024
Award: Yellow Pencil
Yellow Pencil / Music Videos / Editing
Award: Yellow Pencil
Yellow Pencil / Direction / Long Form
Award: Wood Pencil
Wood Pencil / Music Videos / Performance
Award: Shortlist
Shortlist / Music Videos / Direction
Award: Shortlist
Shortlist / Cinematography / Long Form
Chronicling the origins of Mette’s emergence as a performer, musician, and dancer, stylistically evocative and visually striking shots of Mette performing intercuts with culturally referential footage of sex, birth, violence, destruction, rebirth and celebration, growing increasingly personal as the song continues. By the first chorus, amongst the clips is a young Mette in home videos with her mother. Running counter to stereotypical imagery of mothering, the edit matches Mette’s choreography and lyrics by splicing in old Hollywood dance films, wild animals, and an array of protests.
What did the judges have to say?
Music videos remain the most powerful means by which an individual director's creative signature can be seen. However, performance videos, which many artists and labels want, typically do the exact opposite; it's notoriously difficult to do a great performance video. But what Camille Summers-Valli created with her music video for Mette was groundbreaking and inimitable. It will become the bar for what other artists and directors hope to achieve. Each choice in how archival, performance and personal footage was interwoven was so intentional, so perfectly clever and so perfectly connected to make you feel the gamut of emotions, while still remaining so restrained, truly sets it apart.
Ali Brown, President, PRETTYBIRD
Are you credited on this winning entry?
If you've been awarded Wood Pencil or above, drop us your details for further information about how you can order your D&AD Pencil. If you've previously won In Book or a Nomination and would like to celebrate your achievement with a Wood or Graphite Pencil, please let us know.