PROFILE: Lex Halaby, Refused TV

Lex Halaby directs music videos, mostly of the alternative/hard rock variety. These are some of them:

• Cobra Starship "Snakes On A Plane"
• Killswitch Engage "My Curse"
• Atmosphere "National Disgrace"
• The Frames "Dream Awake"
• Hoobastank "Inside of You"

And this is his Video Static profile...

name: Lex Halaby
company: Refused TV
job/title: Director

first video: My first video was for a small punk band out of Sacramento called Red Tape. I heard they were considering a couple directors, but I wanted to land my first job so badly I drove four hundred miles from Los Angeles to Sacramento to meet the band in person. The concept had some animated effects so I brought an animatic of the entire video, along with some concept sketches to help them visualize it. Fortunately the $100 of gas paid off and the next week I booked the video. We shot parts of the video in Sacramento, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. By the end of the project I logged well over 2,000 miles on my car, but I loved every moment of it. I recently heard that my animatic still exists on a post house hard drive. Apparently, my crudely drawn pictures are so hilarious that they decided to keep it on file… I wouldn’t be surprised if I found it on YouTube one of these days.

strangest video: Honestly, I think the music video creative process is strange to begin with, so this is a hard one. Besides working with Samuel L. Jackson on the "Snakes On A Plane" video — which was interesting, if not surreal —  I would have to say the most bizarre music video experience actually happened in pre-production on a Killswitch Engage project several years back. I was scouting a burnt forest in a state park just outside Los Angeles with my DP. We were alone in the middle of the woods when we heard a rustle in some nearby bushes. We turned around to find a barrel of a shotgun squarely pointed at us. A Park Ranger began barking orders at us to freeze and drop to the ground. Needless to say we followed his directions carefully. We stayed face down on the ground for several minutes while he went through our bags and ran our IDs. Apparently he mistook my director’s finder for a poacher’s scope and thought we were illegally hunting wild game. After realizing we were just some "harmless" filmmakers he was embarrassed by his over reaction, so he compensated by writing me a parking violation for blocking the trail entrance instead. To this day I regret not getting his badge number.

what’s next: I have several projects in the pipeline for this summer that I can’t divulge until the ink dries on the contracts, so they will have to remain nameless for now. I did, however, just wrap a video for Meg & Dia that should be hitting the airwaves soon. It’s a mixture of animated photography and live action, so keep an eye out for that one. Speaking of photography, I’ll also be having my first photo exhibit this summer. Over the last several years I’ve shot a substantial amount of black and white photography in refugee camps all over the world. I try to stay as creatively diverse as possible and traveling to remote places gives me the perspective to keep my sanity in this otherwise insane business. And speaking of insane business, I have to run. My screenplay is feeling neglected.

NEW RELEASE: Elephant Man f/ Wyclef "Five O"

There is a long history of “getting hassled by the cops” videos in hip-hop and the latest clip from Elephant Man and Wyclef puts a Caribbean spin on the harassment with the help of director Gil Green. We meet our protagonists and the shady cops who pursue them in Miami’s Little Haiti neighborhood. While we understand that the song is about the police un-lawfully bothering Elephant and Clef, it's clear that the authorities may have reason to suspect our heroes are involved in the kind of, um, illegal activity  also described in Chamillionaire’s “Ridin Dirty.” The chase is on and Elephant Man and Wyclef take us on a running, jumping, climbing pursuit through the colorful Haitian/Jamaican sections of South Florida. Like every episode of Cops, the bad boys end up in the back of a police van – perhaps reinforcing the lesson from HBO’s immortal The Wire  : When avoiding the cops, leave the distinctive hairstyle at home (review by Doug Stern). --> watch "Five O"

Elephant Man feat. Wyclef Jean "Five O" (VP/Bad Boy/Atlantic)
Gil Green, director | Judd Allison , producer | 305 Films , production co | Tom Marvel, DP | T. David Binns, editor

BOOKED: The Used - Lisa Mann, director

artist: The Used
song: "Pretty Handsome Awkward"
label: Reprise/Warner Bros.
director(s): Lisa Mann
production co: The Revolver Film Co.
DP: Miroslav Bazsak

BOOKED: Jennifer Lopez - Sanji, director

artist: Jennifer Lopez
song: "Me Haces Falta"
label: Epic
director(s): Sanji
production co: Reactor Films
rep: Yell Productions

SHOT: Bright Eyes - Patrick Daughters, director

Screens, projections, psychedelic patterns, white lights/white suits... A series of photographs taken from the Brooklyn set of the new Bright Eyes video, "Hot Knives." Click em, make em bigger.

artist: Bright Eyes
song: "Hot Knives"
label: Polydor UK/Saddle Creek
director(s): Patrick Daughters
production co: The Directors Bureau
commissioner: Jill Kaplan/Skyway Productions

NEW RELEASE: Ozzy Osbourne "I Don't Wanna Stop"

Ozzy Osbourne is the Iron Man. Now almost 60 years old and having weathered everything from drug addiction, alcoholism, a gnarly ATV accident, the spotlight of an insanely popular reality show and several Ozzfests, it's now damn clear that the Ozzman ain't ever gonna retire. This video for the aptly named track "I Don't Wanna Stop," off his new album Black Rain, is a celebration of his past that also modernizes the basic setup of Ozzy's old Black Sabbath videos for "Paranoid" and "Iron Man." --> watch "I Don't Wanna Stop"

Ozzy Osbourne "I Don't Wanna Stop" (Epic)
Tony T. Ushino, director/editor/producer | Andrew Deerin, co-producer | Sense Indulgence Media/L2 Digital, production co

SHOT: Circa Survive - Travis Kopach, director

Director Travis Kopach and DP Jon Fordham plot the next move on the set of a Circa Survive video.

artist: Circa Survive
song: "The Difference Between Medicine and Poison Is In the Dose"
label: Equal Vision
director(s): Travis Kopach
production co: Dignity & Shame/Refused TV

SHOT: My American Heart - Travis Kopach, director

My American Heart performing for DP Jon Fordham out in the Seattle woods...

artist: My American Heart
song: "The Shake (Awful Feeling)"
label: Warcon
director(s): Travis Kopach
production co: Dignity & Shame/Refused TV

BOOKED: Suzanne Vega - Thomas Horne, director

Suzanne Vega is back after a six year recording gap with her first album for Blue Note.

artist: Suzanne Vega
song: "Frank And Ava"
label: Blue Note
director(s): Thomas Horne
production co: Karma Kollective
rep: RW Media

BOOKED: Tiny Dancers - Paul Minor, director

artist: Tiny Dancers
song: "Ashes And Diamonds"
label: Parlophone
director(s): Paul Minor
production co: Streetgang Films