Billed as a Short Film, "We Cry Together" goes even beyond that: It's essentially a filmed piece of live theater. Kendrick Lamar and Taylour Paige go back and forth at each other as the camera roves around them, capturing the raw conversational rap and the even more NSFW ending.
External perfection ain't worth shit when you're hollow inside. And meticulous, fabricated art often can't come close to what the natural world can just do by doing what it does.
Just some of the themes in this latest stunner of a video from director AG Rojas for Florence + The Machine.
A nifty progression from the last Francis And The Lights video — which featured Kanye and Bon Iver — this time letting Chance The Rapper show some stillness and some moves.
Why spend all day shooting a video when you can get what you need in 4.2 seconds. That's the trick of this latest ingenious OK Go clip, where they carefully choreographed what becomes a full, proper music video to the length of the song when displayed in super slo-mo.
How'd they do it? Luckily, frontman and video director Damian Kulash, Jr. cares to share, providing a Background Notes page breaking down the intricate plotting needed to make sure the 318 seperate "events" got captured correctly via seven highspeed cameras controlled by robotic arms. Shit, he even shares his spreadsheet to see how detailed you need to be.
Wise men enter prison with a brave face, but they also leave with fear as they step out into the unknowns of freedom. That's the crux of this short story of a music video Woody Harrelson as a long incarcerated man reconnecting with his daughter — played by real-life daughter, Zoe Harrelson — and the rest of his life.
"Song For Someone" serves as a thematic tie-in with Sundance series RECTIFY, about a perhaps innocent man who gets freed after 19 yers on Death Row.
Don't call it a comeback, but "Close Your Eyes (And Count To F**k)" marks the music video return of two of my faves: director AG Rojas and Rage Against The Machine frontman Zack De La Rocha. And it's one motherf**k of a return, presenting an epic and exhausting brawl between Cop and Kid that might not detonate on-screen, but could prove explosive as a nationwide conversation about police brutality rages on.
AG Rojas, director: "When Run The Jewels sent me this track, I knew we had the opportunity to create a film that means something. I felt a sense of responsibility to do just that. We had to exploit the lyrics and aggression and emotion of the track, and translate that into a film that would ignite a valuable and productive conversation about racially motivated violence in this country. It's provocative, and we all knew this, so we were tasked with making something that expressed the intensity of senseless violence without eclipsing our humanity. For me, it was important to write a story that didn’t paint a simplistic portrait of the characters of the Cop and Kid. They're not stereotypes. They're people - complex, real people and, as such, the power had to shift between them at certain points throughout the story. The film begins and it feels like they have been fighting for days, they’re exhausted, not a single punch is thrown, their violence is communicated through clumsy, raw emotion. They've already fought their way past their judgments and learned hatred toward one another. Our goal was to highlight the futility of the violence, not celebrate it."
I don't want to spoil this one for you. And I don't say that as way to get around having to explain this complex exploration of love, distrust, tragedy and rebirth.
Let's just say Florence Welch and director Vince Haycock know that in order to shock, you have to be honest and fearless. And this video is both of those, and a whole lot more.
