Taylor Swift took her All Too Well short film to the Toronto International Film Festival earlier this week and reignited a conversation about the titular red scarf from the fan-favorite ballad.
Videos by American Songwriter
As many fans had long theorized, the scarf may not actually be lingering in the drawer of her ex-lover (the lyric reads: And I, left my scarf there at your sister’s house / And you’ve still got it in your drawer even now). The scarf is instead a carefully constructed metaphor.
During an interview at TIFF, Swift presented the short film/music video, starring Stranger Things‘ Sadie Sink and The Maze Runner’s Dylan O’Brien. The video follows a young woman whose heart is shattered by an older boyfriend, mirroring the lyrical content of the song.
Of the scarf she said, “Basically, the scarf is a metaphor, and we turned it red because red it a very important color in this album, which is called Red,” Swift quipped, prompting laughter from the audience. “And, I think when I say it’s a metaphor, I’m just going to stop.”
Keeping things as shaded as ever, Swift didn’t divulge any further information, but it was enough to get her Swifties reworking their theories and adding the interview to their evidence files. A nice distraction from waiting for her impending album, Midnights, which drops on October 21.
Elsewhere during the TIFF interview, Swift talked about making the decision to work on the film saying, “It wasn’t like I woke up one day and I was like, ‘You know what I want to direct. I didn’t go to film school.” Swift then cited working on countless music videos and claiming her long hours on set for each of them gave her a look into working behind the camera, sparking her interest in the pursuit.
“All the decisions that you make, it’s such a beautifully collaborative process,” she continued. “You make decisions, you know, based on your idea as to how you want it to feel, how you want it to look. And then you bring on people you trust.”
One key collaborator for Swift on All Too Well was cinematographer Rina Yang. “I brought her on early on and showed her my endless mood boards and my references, and what I was looking for in terms of lighting and color and texture. It was pretty apparent that we both wanted to shoot on 35 millimeter. I did not know how to do that. She really, really, really taught me a lot, and I never would have known anything at all without her.”
Check out the short film from Swift below.
(Photo by Gotham/GC Images)
So, is the “red scarf” symbolic of something he took that he CAN’T give back?