Synopsis

Dolores O'Riordan listens to "Just My Imagination" on a portable CD player while moving through a stark industrial landscape. As the music takes hold, ordinary surroundings give way to playful fantasy: butterflies appear, colorful images unfold, and she drifts through an almost storybook world, including a hot-air balloon sequence. The Cranberries perform amid stylized black-and-white imagery, while glimpses of cars, smoke stacks, and rough streets repeatedly pull Dolores back toward reality. The video contrasts everyday grit with the liberating power of imagination.

Factoids & Trivia

• The video was filmed over two days in July 1999. The outdoor material was shot in Poolbeg, Dublin, around the Pigeon House Hotel and the old Poolbeg Generator Plant, while studio work took place at Ardmore Studios in County Wicklow.

• Its central idea came from a story about someone walking with a Walkman and imagining a surreal world while listening to music. The treatment developed that idea into a fantasy that repeatedly collides with reality.

• The production deliberately juxtaposed the song's bright pop character with industrial settings, smoke stacks, and run-down streets. The contrast was intended to show how imagination could transform an unfriendly environment.

• The vintage-looking vehicles were chosen to make the setting feel out of time, with the visual atmosphere recalling Ireland in the early 1980s.

• The unusual microphone Dolores uses was custom-designed for the video. Its shape was made to echo the rare Citroen driven by the other band members.

• The band-performance footage used an experimental high-contrast black-and-white film stock with virtually no gray scale. This gave the performance sections a stark, graphic appearance.

• A car sequence was made to look more dangerous through the use of a long lens and editing. The vehicle was kept at a safe distance during filming, while the finished cut creates the impression that it comes close to Dolores.