SAM PHAY ‘SKIN’
Two strangers lock eyes and see their future together. Though it ends in tears, do they still try?
CAST
WADA ALEXANDER KUAN
LIV RIAN
CREW
PRODUCER/DIRECTOR: JESSE LEAMAN CINEMATOGRAPHER: CARL ALLISON
1ST AD: ZAC HARRIS
2ND AD: NICOLE FREEMAN
1ST AC: OLIWIER GESLA
GAFFER: JAY MCLAUGHLIN
GRIP: ALEXANDER ANDERSON
HMU: EMILY ELISABETH
EDITOR: JESSE LEAMAN
COLOURIST: TIM WHITING
I wanted to convey the idea of love being hopeless and beautiful; ask the question: If you knew it would end, would you still try? In my personal experiences of love and its wake, I have come to find that love is both forever and temporary... When things come to an end, I feel content. I think we can appreciate the beautiful times spent together and respectfully let things end in peace. I'm a sucker for love...
As I look back now, writing this sort of retrospective essay on this project brings back a lot of emotions. It reminds me of where we were, and to understand some of the motives behind the decisions made for this music video, you have to understand the time and place we were in. This was conceptualised during the heart of the Covid pandemic, as a long-term relationship of my own was falling apart. You can see these motives of love play out. Especially where some of the heavy inspirations at the time came from.
Above - “Love me like you hate me” - Rainsford
The Concept: Strangers on a Train
The concept originates from the meeting of two strangers on a train as it hurtles towards a metaphorical future they can foresee, and they know that their future together will end in pain, heartbreak, and turmoil.
The way Carl Alison, our cinematographer, helped bring this to life with cinematography and lighting was by blacking out the entire Hitachi train. On the outside, we had our assistants moving these large lights back and forth to create movement as the train hurtled towards its inevitable future.
First Collaboration and Choreography
This was my first official collaboration with Wada. Wada is a really talented dancer, and I knew I really wanted to work with him after I met him on the set of a different production, so I approached him with this song and I knew we could come up with something special together. We actually—between himself, myself, and Liv, his co-star—choreographed the movement. I wanted it to feel somewhere between movement and dance, and play around with these motives of the push and pull of a relationship, the touch and feel, and how arguments are playing out within, and how there’s love and how they support each other. There’s a really beautiful moment where she falls down and he lifts her up just by lifting her up by her chin, and then when they both sit down on either side, they each touch their lips with their thumb—a memory of the taste of one another.
This whole clip required a lot of intimacy and a lot of trust between the two actors, which I feel we managed to achieve very beautifully.
Above - ‘Marriage Story’. Bellow ‘Lost in Translation’
Skin
on
Skin
From rehearsal room to final sequences.
“If nothing else, we have each other”
The rooftop scene is my favourite moment between them—this, for me, is at a turning point and acceptance of when two people still love each other but know that it’s not working. There is that beautiful kiss just before they start to fall further and further apart…
In the finale, I wanted to have Wada embrace a somewhat primitive anger and dance. I wanted him to be breaking in and out of this movement that he tries to go into with rage, as the rain is falling down on him and the weight of the world and the sadness of it all.
The way we achieved this is our cinematographer hid behind a piece of Plexiglass, wrapped himself up in some plastic bags, and we had just 1 light behind him with a reflector and a hose for the rain, shooting in a high frame rate on the Red Dragon.
As we reach our final chorus the couples connection is gone. They now barely acknowledge each other. They attempt to have a moment of intimacy which causes a battle between the two. They leave each other, our man goes outside to share his frustrations to the sky as she fights her pain inside.
