The video begins with Depeche Mode's singer Dave Gahan lying on a bed in a foetal-like position, to then roll over onto his side. The room is mainly dark with bright accents from the bedding and wall art. There are multiple different shots of him as he rolls around in bed, looking uncomfortable. Match-on-action editing is then used to transition him lying in bed to show him lying in a bathtub. This is symbolic to Dave's recent heroin overdose which was heavily documented in music media at the time, specifically the overdose in which he died for 2 minutes. It is also symbolic of the fact that the band hadn't made any music for 4 years which was a much larger gap between an album than people were used to from the band. At the time, people assumed that they had split up and were no longer going to be releasing music as Alan Wilder departed in 1995 and both Dave and Martin were dealing with substance abuse issues. It was rumoured that Songs of Faith and Devotion was going to be their last. This music video was like a big comeback for them, which is why there are a lot of particular themes in it.
The acting from Dave is very much what you'd expect from someone addicted to heroin. As I stated initially, him lying in the foetal position could be to represent a kind of 'rebirth' for him and the band post-drug-and-Alan-departure. It could also be to symbolise how much him as a person had been reduced, simply to a baby.
The editing throughout this video is rather fast-paced, which is unfitting with the music, as it is rather slow paced, bass-y and grungey. But, the editing is fast paced to emphasise how intense and fast-paced it was when the individual band member's lives were going off the rails.
The mise-en-scene for the first half of the video is in a very grim, dark and grungy-looking It is simply just to symbolise the bad, dirty place that Dave was in prior to this.
In the second part of the music video, director Anton Corbjin put a cardboard tube around the outside of the camera lens. It is not confirmed as to why he did this, but from my perspective, it allows all shots from this point onwards look as though the person in the frame is trapped in a small tunnel, which again, just symbolises the band's struggles at the time. The use of a handheld camera is also done to emphasise a sense of disorientation.
It is hard to distinguish if the purpose of this music video is purely for aesthetic purposes, to provide the band with a new rock n roll look or if it is to provide the audience with an insight into the band's private lives behind the music. This is due to the music video fitting into Anton Corbjin's auteur style, as many of his photography projects look similar to this music video:
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