Coldplay-The Scientist narrative structure

The video for the soundtrack 'The Scientist' by Coldplay uses a reverse linear narrative and plot structure, whereby the whole video is played in reverse, so that the audience know at the start of the video the unfortunate circumstances that he ends up in, and the remainder of the video is the plot slowly unraveling itself as to what resulted in him ending up in such a bleak situation. However, the slow revealing of the serious and devastating plot of the action code of the car crash that starts (although technically ends the music video) acts as the driving enigma throughout the video and keeps the audience engaged, relying heavily on the narrative structure of the video to sell itself to its audience.
The narrative structure of this video conforms to Andrew Goodwin's theory that states that visuals should amplify, or contradict the lyrics and music (in this case the lyrics are amplified). 

Lyrics:

Come up to meet you, tell you I'm sorry
You don't know how lovely you are
I had to find you, tell you I need you
Tell you I set you apart

Tell me your secrets and ask me your questions
Oh, let's go back to the start

Running in circles, coming up tails
Heads on a science apart

Nobody said it was easy
It's such a shame for us to part
Nobody said it was easy
No one ever said it would be this hard
Oh, take me back to the start

I was just guessing at numbers and figures
Pulling the puzzles apart
Questions of science, science and progress
Could not speak as loud as my heart

Tell me you love me, come back and hold me
Oh when I rush to the start
Running in circles, chasing tails
Coming back as we are

Nobody said it was easy
Oh, it's such a shame for us to part
Nobody said it was easy
No one ever said it would be so hard
I'm going back to the start

The song itself plays off the repetitive one line from the song 'take me back to the start' as the narrative structure is in reverse, which along with the desperate and sorrow lyrics echo his desire and longing to go back to how his life was before the accident. The video amplifies the lyrics by literally showing him walking back through his life and the events that caused him such misery.

The song itself has a diverging narrative, as the establishing shot is the only one whereby both the performance and narrative align. It is the key line 'oh let's go back to the start' which acts as the prompt for the performer to literally walk the audience through the painful events. The performer continues to perform the lyrics directly to the camera, as if acknowledging the audiences existence as a performer would, making the viewer as an audience feel closer to the artist; again using another of Goodwins conventions of regular close up's so that the audience establish a seemingly personal relationship to the artist. However by performing in such a way, it takes away the realism and seriousness of the narrative, and therefore conforms to the conventions of a music video with the focus on the performance element, as opposed to merely the narrative element such as a short film would.