Well shot. Well acted. It’s an itty bitty movie, people.
Your typical music video about a man stepping out on his wife has the woman scorned (a) trashing that cheater’s Beemer after (b) she gives away all his Armani suits to Goodwill and (c) the ending has her slapping him while he (d) sadly spots the FOR SALE sign next to all his other worldly possession currently being burned in the front yard.
Sam the Smith avoids the Hollywood ending and gives us ambiguity. Will she stay or leave? How long will the masquerade last?
Now, there are little things to nitpick. Sam is a man with a great deep voice, and this is shot with the female actress being the one cheated on, so that does start out a little odd. Also, Sam’s rocking a haircut that’s very, I don’t know, British. HOWEVER: you can always scratch at itty bitty details.
Overall, this music video stands out for great cinematography, which most bands can’t even spell, with great acting and the guts to avoid a Hollywood ending, even if they hired all kinds of Hollywood talent to pull this off.
I tip my hat to Sam the Smith and pray to the music gods that he makes more like this, if only to counter the effects of new One Direction videos.
Music videos tend to come in a few generic flavors: (a) pop divas singing with backup-dancers, (b) boy bands singing while serving as their own backup dancers and (c) rockers howling while they sort of dance. For variety, musicians sometimes (d) try to get deep and artsy by filming their video in black-and-white. Whoa.
Truly different music videos are rare.
The exception: 30 SECONDS TO MARS rocks at almost every music video they do, but that’s because Jared Leto is a legit Hollywood actor who knows how to make big honking movies, much less short films. The man has an Oscar and such.
So whatever you think of Iggy, she does put effort into her music videos. FANCY was a nice riff on the movie CLUELESS, and now she pays homage (hipsters: go fight about how to pronounce that word) to the classic KILL BILL movies.
This is all good movie-music karma, since KILL BILL has one of the most epic soundtracks of all time.
HOWEVER: shooting great photos with a Nikon of Infinite Beauty is insanely simple compared to what this man did with an iPad, his finger and talent on loan from the gods.
I’ll happily write about a music video if the lyrics are interesting, if the song is great — or the music video tells a story.
Gentle readers, we have hit the trifecta.
These lyrics are interesting, the song is great and the video tells a powerful story.
THE SONG
Thought it was Cake, by the voice and the horns. But no, it’s some band called Flobots. Not the best name. Makes me think of an android version of Flo from the Geico commercials, and I don’t want rock bands selling me insurance. HOWEVER: the name is irrelevant if the lyrics are interesting and the video rocks.
THE VIDEO
The usual music video features (1) the band lip-syncing and pretending to play instruments in three different locations with six different costume changes, (2) the lead singer mouthing the words while trying to look cool in sunglasses and slo-mo or (3) all kinds of backup dancers going crazy behind the lead singer.
Instead, we’ve got a music video that doesn’t feature the band AT ALL.
This video tells an actual story, with a beginning, a middle and end. There are setups and payoffs, private stakes and public stakes.
I could geek out about it in a story sense. If professors can base college courses on Star Trek, or Madonna’s cheesy videos, then somebody could use this video do to a flipping dissertation.
Also, the style is great. Reminds me of all the stuff from the Animatrix, which was 9.942 bazillion times better than THE MATRIX: RELOADED and THE MATRIX: REVOLUTIONS — or whatever the second and third stupid parts of that trilogy were called.
Would I see THE MATRIX again? Sure, anytime. Brilliant movie. Could you shower me with enough purple euros to watch the two sequels again? No. Purple euros would have to join forces with alcohols.
Bottom line: the technical term for this music video is “awesomesauce.”
THE LYRICS
The words are worthy and don’t need a lot of red penning, either to interpret or poke fun. These lyrics abide.
If you’re any kind of writer, or student of the English language, you can take these apart and smile at how they work. Enjoy.
I can ride my bike with no handlebars
No handlebars
No handlebars
I can ride my bike with no handlebars
No handlebars
No handlebars
Look at me, look at me
Hands in the air like its good to be
Alive and I’m a famous rapper
Even when the paths are all crookedy
I can show you how to dosey doe
I can show you how to scratch a record
I can take apart the remote control
And I can almost put it back together
I can tie a knot in a cherry stem
I can tell you about Leif Ericson
I know all the words to “De Colores”
And “I’m proud to be an American”
Me and my friends saw a platypus
Me and my friends made a comic book
And guess how long it took
I can do anything that I want ’cause look
I can keep rhythm with no metronome
No metronome
No metronome
I can see your face on the telephone
On the telephone
On the telephone
Look at me, look at me
Just called to say that its good to be
Alive in such a small world
I’m all curled up with a book to read
I can make money open up a thrift store
I can make a living off a magazine
I can design an engine
64 miles to the gallon on gasoline
I can make new antibiotics
I can make computer survive aquatic
Conditions I know how to run the business
And I can make you wanna buy a product
Movers shakers and producers
Me and my friends understand the future
I see the strings that control the systems
I can do anything with no resistance ’cause
I can lead a nation with a microphone
With a microphone
With a microphone
And I can split the atoms of a molecule
Of a molecule
Of a molecule
Look at me, look at me
Driving and I won’t stop
And it feels so good to be alive and on top
My reach is global
My tower secure
My cause is noble
My power is pure
I can handout a million vaccinations
Or let em all die from exasperation
Have ’em all healed from their lacerations
Or have em all killed by assassination
I can make anybody go to prison
Just because I don’t like them
I can do anything with no permission
I have it all under my command because
I can guide a missile by satellite
By satellite
By satellite
And I can hit a target through a telescope
Through a telescope
Through a telescope
And I can end the planet in a holocaust
In a holocaust
In a holocaust
In a holocaust
In a holocaust
In a holocaust
I can ride my bike with no handlebars
No handlebars
No handlebars
I can ride my bike with no handlebars
No handlebars
No handlebars
That’s the acid test for every writer: four words.
If somebody in line with you for the Largest Latte Known to Man asks what you’re working on, can you explain it in four words?
How about eight words?
Because if you can’t, you’re not really done.
And I don’t care that you’ve spent the last seven years locked away in a French monastery, slaving away 25 hours a day, eight days a week to perfect (a) The Great American Novel, Even Though It Was Written in France, (b) the movie script that will turn Hollywood on its ear and stop it from spending $250 million apiece on Michael Bay explosion-fests involving robots that transform into cars or whatever or (c) a punk-rock masterpiece with song after song with lyrics so beautiful, and rebelliously ugly, that anyone who listens to it quits working for The Man and buys an electric Fender so they can learn the only three chords you need to know to become AN INSANE ROCK GOD.
So let’s get down to it. If you haven’t already, read these posts to get all educated and such, even though it is technically cheating — because today, there is a quiz.
Loglines, which, if you weren’t paying attention, are short little summaries of movies and books and such.
There are two ways to score this quiz, the first involving length and the second quality.
Four words or less gets you an A, five words is a B and so forth.
Quality is subject, but even if your logline is insanely brilliant, anything over eight words gets a big fat F, and F that glows in the dark and follows you around for a week like a bad cold or a moldy metaphor, which is like a simile, but different.
Sidenote: If you are a Literary Muffin of Stud, go ahead and share your brilliant answers in the comments. Then we’ll talk smack.
Sidenote on the side of that sidenote: If you are a shy lurker, as 99.9 percent of writers are, print this and scribble your answers, then share your brilliant answers somewhere, with somebody. Because it’s time you stopped being a shy lurker writer type. YOUR HEAD WILL NOT EXPLODE. Maybe you’ll even make a friend over the Series of Tubes and such, fall in love, get married and move to a former dairy farm in Vermont or whatever. These things have happened.
Quiz Part 1) Write a logline for your favorite movie, but turn the villain into the hero without changing the story.
Example
STAR WARS: Wise ruler fights to stop murderous rebels, who keep blowing up invaluable public property.
Shot the length rule to bits there. Let’s shorten it to five words.
STAR WARS: Wrinkled leader battles murderous rebels.
There we go. I like it. Could have nailed four words if we smited “wrinkled,” but I don’t care.
Bonus, because we hit five words and give ourselves an A++ and such: Palpatine’s Greatest Hits, Vol. 1.
Quiz Part 2) Take your current project — movie, novel, performance art piece involving a dance number that expresses your feelings about unemployment — and write a logline making fun of it.
Go ahead. Have at it.
It’s more fun than you’d expect.
Quiz Part 3) Write five fresh loglines by twisting or rewriting stupid books and movies that had promise, then took all that promise and blew it to pieces with The 12-gauge of Utter Stupidity.
Examples
MATRIX REVOLUTIONS: Man wins war against robot enslavers.
Six words. It’s a better plot, because not Keanu “Whoah” Reeves doesn’t sacrifice his life to play virus cleaner for the robots, therefore protecting the status quo and ensuring a cycle of endless war and nuttiness. His death actually changes things with this logline. But six words is still too long.
MATRIX REVOLUTIONS: Man frees mankind from robots.
Five words. Too many “mans” in there. Where’s Trinity and such? But it’s better.
ONE SHOT: Tom Cruise is a foot too short to play Reacher.
Yes, I am a bad man. The trailer still looks awful. Couldn’t they find some short actors to play the thugs who Tom Cruise beats up? It looks like junior high bullies hassling a second-grader for his lunch money.
ONE DAY: Man meets girl, loses girl, gets girl back.
That’s the standard plot for every romantic comedy ever, but it’s also 1,398 times better than the actual plot of ONE DAY where man meets girl, man loses girl, man loses girl again, man finally marries girl, girl gets RANDOMLY PANCAKED BY A TRUCK, man is sad, roll credits.
TRANSFORMERS 3: DARK SIDE OF THE MOON OR WHATEVER: Magic robots leave Earth, because why would magic robots need our lame technology and such anyway? Also, Megan Fox buys a pair of pants.
I’m cheating again, though it is fun. Alright, TRANSFORMERS 3: Robot war obliterates Earth.
Much better. Also, it’s right up the alley of Michael Bay, who loves nothing more than blowing up stuff anyway.
My friend Max (short for Maxima, though if it were short for Maximus that would also be cool in a GLADIATOR way) has introduced me to Macklemore.
He’s a Seattle rapper famous for the THRIFT STORE song and video, which is worth an entirely post by itself.
I’d heard Macklemore’s songs on the radio and such, but not the music videos, seeing how MTV doesn’t play vids anymore because, you know, wall-to-wall Jersey Shore nonsense and such. Snooki needs her screen time.
This video is long and courageous and well done.
I salute you, Macklemore, for having the range to do a hilarious romp like THRIFT STORE and the guts to do this quiet little beauty.
Now, the usual music video features (a) some kind of singer or rock band (b) singing and rocking, and possibly trying to (c) dance, though if they can’t dance, the can (d) look tough or (e) let their backup dancers go crazy while the singers and rockers look tough. The toughest part is whether to film in an empty warehouse or on top of a roof.
For pop singers and boy bands, it’s even simpler: they have to sing WHILE dancing, and it doesn’t really matter where.
Music videos that tell a story, like some kind of moving picture, with a script and such, are rare. Because that sort of thing is work, you see, and the rock bands who try usually shoot for “artsy” and merely slam hard into “the Wall of Pretentious.”
This isn’t quite art, and it doesn’t quite make sense, but it is interesting and different and ambitious. I salute the Shins for aiming high instead of setting up their drums and amps in the parking lot of a vacant K-mart, just to be ironic.
For you musical types, here are the lyrics for you to dissect and decipher:
Well, this is just a simple song,
To say what you done.
I told you ’bout all those fears,
And away they did run.
You sure must be strong,
And you feel like an ocean being warmed by the sun.
When I was just nine-years-old,
I swear that I dreamt,
Your face on a football field,
And a kiss that I kept,
Under my vest.
Apart from everything,
But the heart in my chest.
Chorus:
I know that things can really get rough,
When you go it alone,
Don’t go thinking you gotta be tough,
And play like a stone.
Could be there’s nothing else in our lives so critical,
As this little home.
My life in an upturned boat,
Marooned on a cliff.
You brought me a great big flood,
And you gave me a lift.
Girl, what a gift.
When you tell me with your tongue,
And your breath was in my lungs,
And we float up through the rift.
Chorus:
I know that things can really get rough,
When you go it alone.
Don’t go thinking you gotta be tough,
And play like a stone.
Could be there’s nothing else in our lives so critical,
As this little home.
Well, this would be a simple song,
To say what you done.
I told you ’bout all those fears,
And away they did run.
You sure must be strong,
When you feel like an ocean being warmed by the sun.
Remember walking a mile to your house,
Aglow in the dark?
I made a fumbling play for your heart,
And the act struck a spark.
You wore a charm on the chain that I stole,
Especial for you.
Love’s such a delicate thing that we do,
With nothing to prove,
Which I never knew.
If you are a child of the ’80s, or even alive and conscious during that decade, you remember some nutty TV shows that — at the time — we thought were cool.
THE A-TEAM is unwatchable today. Go fire it up on Netflix or whatever. The fourth time in a row that (a) Mr. T says “I pity the fool” as (b) bullets spray all over the place and (c) bad guy cars jump in the air and do that half-flip, you’ll do a facepalm, and right in the middle of that facepalm, Col. Hannibal will light up a cigar and say, “I love it when a plan comes together.”
Other things we watched and thought were cool: AIRWOLF and that show where some American guy thinks he’s a ninja because he has an old wise mentor and is constantly fighting some actual ninja who actually should be the hero, seeing how he was the only real ninja within 100 miles.
Anyway, the point is, they’re rebooting one of the nuttiest relics from the Glowing Tube back in the ’80s: MANIMAL.
This is great news for America, and for bored college kids looking for something watch and dissect, as a group, when they’ve had too much Pabst Blue Ribbon to write that term paper about dialectical materialism as it relates to Madonna’s early videos, the ones before she’d married Sean Penn.
Here’s the classic MANIMAL intro.
Watch the hero as he trasforms, and no, they didn’t get this idea when they hired the special effects guy who turned Michael Jackson into a werewolf.
Special bonus: SPACE SHERIFF triple transformation
Note that I have no idea what this show is, aside from a possible father of POWER RANGERS, but it is awesome.
The Red Pen of Doom 