'Hello' music video adds nuance to Adele's emotional single

In case anyone missed it, Adele is back with her first single off the upcoming “25,” set to be released at the end of next month. Appropriately titled “Hello,” the track marks the epic singer’s first release since “Skyfall” in 2012 and since undergoing surgery to remove polyps on her vocal chords.

Adele is not singing to her fans, as the title might suggest. This is no "Hello, my adoring public." Rather, she is doing what she has done all along -- singing heartbreakingly beautiful and plaintive songs. As always, the real strength of the song is Adele's voice, followed closely by the lyrical content, which, in "Hello," is far above par. At nearly five minutes long, “Hello” is a behemoth among pop tracks, but it’s one of those songs that seems to compress time, seeming far shorter than it is.

Longer still is the music video for the new single -- directed by Xavier Dolan -- which clocks in at just over six minutes long. Uploaded on Oct. 22, the video has wracked up over 70 million views on YouTube as of press time. 

The opening shot of the video immediately gives the impression that something is awry. A window slowly comes into focus, along with the rest of the world beyond it. In the distance, a car drives along a road, past the driveway leading to the house and out of the shot.

Filmed in a washed-out, green-tinged sepia, the "Hello" music video is reminiscent of Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep” (2010) aesthetic. The green-ish hue of the video perhaps serves two purposes. The first may be to make sure the video does not appear too old. The set is clearly too modern to be placed in a strict black and white palette. Second, the color seems to suggest that all is not well.

It's clear that the video takes place in the past; Adele’s hair and clothes are retro in style. Short shots show the singer using a flip phone as she walks through an old, deserted house. The camera sometimes jumps to shots of Adele standing in the woods, decked out in a massive fuzzy jacket. Perhaps this is present-day Adele, narrating the rest of the video with her song.

Like any good story, this one gives some background. Appearing to take Adele's perspective, the camera focuses on a man's face as he cooks, smiles and looks at the camera lovingly. In a matter of shots, a relationship dynamic is established, and it’s the kind that makes viewers either want to grab a tub of ice cream and hug it (while eating it) or go gaga over how cute it is.

Slowly, however, the relationship unravels on the screen. The emotional drive of Adele’s song is relatively even throughout; that is, there is no real climax. Still, the video captures the song's emotional ebbs and flows, adding nuance to the song. If there were ever a single metric for measuring the quality of a music video, this would be it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQHsXMglC9A