Music video Annlin Chao directed for Tom Rosenthal kindles sense of longing

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Through stunning scenes of snow and a humble bit of animation, the official music video Annlin Chao directed for Tom Rosenthal's folk single "Gone Gone” conjures the warmth of a cup of hot chocolate.

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The video follows two fairy-like lights that find each other and dance through a dreamy, yet not unreal, snowscape. We’re still in our world, but a subtle touch of magic is visually revealed, the kind we’ve all felt at different junctures of our lives. Time flows in reverse, where humans ski up mountains, melted droplets fly to icicle tips, where animals chase each other backwards. The curious pair of lights follow their own course of journey, illuminating a number of timber cabins with their own blissful hues of pink and blue on their way, before vanishing into the mountains together.

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A delicate balance between animation and live action was crucial. Annlin Chao, the director, explains how they didn’t want to impose on the natural landscape during post-production. The snow, the cabins, the mountains already offered a narrative that simply needed to be articulated on their behalf. Rather than inserting a character into the setting, it was more of a process of uncovering what was already there in the Swiss Alps, from the minutest details to the grandest scenes. A pair of undefined lights were just enough to accentuate the feelings of owning and losing, simultaneously felt in both the snowy mountains and the song. The lightness of the visuals betrays the arduous journey the team of four had to make through the waist-deep snow in Zermatt to capture the footage with all their equipment.

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Once experienced as a whole, the music and the video are as inseparable as the aroma and the flavour of that bitter-sweet cup of hot chocolate. They call for memories to be relived, memories that are true or constructed, of the past or of the future. They invoke a meditation on what being gone truly means.

Words by Farzad Lee, freelance writer. Contact through farzad.leekai@gmail.com

 

The official music video made for talented singer Tom Rosenthal ;
Link to: https://youtu.be/UOEZchVJHu8

 

Director / Annlin Chao

Art Director / Zuzanna Weiss
Producer / Christian Altherr
Director of Photography / Mick Lin, Christian Altherr
Animation / Annlin Chao, Zuzanna Weiss
Editor / Mick Lin
Colour Grading / Mick Lin
Produced by Annlin Chao Studio

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Tom Rosenthal
Listen on Spotify : https://smarturl.it/GoneGoneSpotify
European Tour Tickets : http://tomrosenthal.co.uk/shows/