Starring Anna Kendrick

         

mtv are cocks, I can't watch this or the homeboy sandman video below. Whas tha point? Pricks.

         

Oh! Is this his sequel to the Boom Boom Pows?

         

can't see it either... any other links to watch it on?

         

mtv licks.... someone hook up a legit link!

         

Don't think you guys are missing much...

         

I don't know. I like my Illumasonic references a bit less blatant.

         

No interest, boring... What happens with LCD??

         

Apparently this video was funded by MTV

From Spinner mag: "The clip for the quirky song off this year's 'This Is Happening' was reportedly funded by MTV, in conjunction with Mean magazine publisher Kashy Khaledi, in an attempt to resurrect the music video as an art form.

MTV head honcho David Gale has said that MTV will continue to finance more music videos, with the intention of drawing recognition to lesser-known bands, allowing directors more latitude for expression and ultimately renewing interest in music video programming.

         

I'm extremely curious. What does the funding amount to? Anyone know?

         

Here's a link to an article about it.

Ok, so this "project" is pointless, right? If you want to see mind-blowing, cutting edge videos, the key is better budgets, not bigger name directors. Unless David Ayer has some magical way of making awesome things appear on camera without any money, why assume that he would make a better LCD Soundsystem video than your average video director? This clip is pretty boring (In Ayer's defense, most directors' first music videos aren't great), and I doubt that anyone who actually made it all the way through can see any difference between this and dozens of other videos that came out this month.

         

training day was great, but this was due in part to fuqua's directing skills; ive seen harsh times too, but there was nothing there to suggest that ayer is a good director (bad acting and 16 mil all the way dont necessarily make for a good indie, despite the rather interesting story)

now, as regards budgets, what's your regular budget? here, for a newcomer its a mere 6k euros and for a more established act its roughly 15k E (in comparison, they were giving 25k euros for the video for a top uk dubstep act)

         

Bad acting? @ legion? budget talks = boring.

In fact, clueless Ant talk. The carnage of comments not worthwhile.

So Christian Bale is bad acting. Only here.

         

did i say bad acting? sorree, i meant bad acting from mr bale, too. the car scene, when he threatens her at gun point, speaks volumes. compare his performance in harsh times to what he did in american psycho, and youll distinguish between good over-the-top delivery and bad, strident, harsh performance.

         

The reason "budget talks" are interesting in this case, is that Mean Magazine and MTV seem to think that substituting a feature director for a younger music video director is going to somehow revive cutting edge music videos. It's a total miscalculation. What made the 1990's such an amazing time for creativity in music videos was the huge budgets that helped directors fully realize their visions. It's not that today's directors aren't as creative, it's that they barely have a tenth of most 90s budgets. This video is evidence of that. They could get Stanley Kubrick to do one of these and they'd still end up with a disappointing video if they don't give him enough funds.

         

^ thanks for clarification @ budget. It does get sterile here if the talk is about budget, budget, budget.

So it's a different time, it's still possible to make some good ones with the right concept. I doubt MTV is looking to push any envelopes, or this can be a fad, to test out niche markets. We'll never know. As it's been decades, the thing is: this is the best they can come with?

I also agree the budgets afforded back then made a difference in the medium. Well everyone agrees.

         

To clarify a little further, I was mostly responding to the way the people behind this concept were talking about it in the article I linked. I believe that great music videos are still being made every day, but there's no way to return to the epic videos that the mtv executive seems to miss without a lot more money.

And I don't think any conversation about the state of music videos is complete without talking about budgets. When artists go from making 500k videos to 5k videos it's definitely going to effect the type of art that's being made. Its the difference between an artist's amazing vision being fully realized and a piece that's charming despite it's limitations.

         

screams!

         

charming despite its limitation is a good description for todays (good) vids