Research into the career of a music video director

Spike Jonze

Spike Jonze was born 22nd October 1969 in Rockville, Maryland. He is progressed from being co founder and one of the orginal editors of Dirt magazine, to becoming an established director. This career started off in music videos in 1992 with a video for Chainsaw Kittens. He has gone on to work with a wider range of artists including Tenacious D, Kanye West, Beastie Boys and R.E.M.

His works with the style of the song to come up with the mood of the pop promo: an example of this is "Oh so quiet" by Bjork. This is because the song begins with a slow pace with the video imitating this with subdued lighting and slow movements , then increasing in pace with the music, with brighter lighting, quicker movement and dance, then reverting back as the song slows down again. Reaction to the promo is mixed with some loving it and others hating it, but much of Spike Jonze work appeals to a limited audience, with people having strong views either way.

Another example of some of Spike Jonze's work is the music video's he did with Fatboy Slim First he did Praise You where Spike Jonze starred as his alter ego Richard Koufey with the fictional dance group the Torrance Community Dance Group. The music video was shot in a guerilla filmmaking style (home video) without permission so at one point in the music video they capture one of the staff stops the music and takes the boombox that is playing the song. The video reportedly cost only US$800 to produce, with most of that money going towards a replacement boombox and food for the cast and crew. The music video won three awards a MTV Video Music Awards.

This music video is one of Spike Jonze's most popular music videos with loads of postive comments like "THIS VIDEO IS PURE EPIC!!!!!! These pple are the shiz!!!", "I love this Video xD" and "Nice!!! :D"

Spike Jonze also did a music video for Weapon of Choice which starred Christopher Walken who a trained as a dancer before becoming an actor. In the music video Walken is filmed dancing around an empty hotel and flying in the end. This resulted in a new generation of Walken fans discovering his dancing talent, therefore promoting not only the song but Walken himself. This won six awards at the MTV awards and being listed in the top 100 music videos of all time. This also had a good responce on YouTube for Christopher Walken and the music video like "I love Chris Walken. He is my hero. He is a great Actor!", "This is my favorite Music Video of all time." and "Everything in this video is great."