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| For those of you who don’t know, Chris Cunningham is one of the most innovative and talented young directors working today. Mostly working with music videos and short films, it’s scarey how fresh and new his ideas can be, and it’ll certainly be a special occasion when he makes his feature legnth debut. This DVD is a brilliantly put together package of his work so far, featuring the majority of his classic music videos and clips from his avant garde short movies and more. Heres a run down of what is featured here. Music Videos Autechre – Second Bad Vilbel This was originally Chris’s first music video, although here it is presented in its remixed and re-edited form, which if my memory serves me correctly was featured as a bonus on one of Autechres most recent albums (‘Confeld’ maybe). The video itself does show that Cunningham had talent, as he makes a video out of pretty much nothing. This re-edited version cuts out a lot of the “alien” footage, because I don’t think he was too happy with it in the first place. Aphex Twin – Come To Daddy If anyone knows of one Cunningham vid, this is it. This was my first exposure to both Cunningham and Aphex, and its stuck with me ever since. I’m not ashamed to admit it scared me when I first saw it because it was so unexpected. Small children running around causing havoc, chasing a poor old woman around, while Aphex on the soundtrack screams “I WANT YOUR SOOOUUUL!”. And as for the whole screaming sequence, well that’s where your friend who you’re showing it to for the first time tells you to “turn this shit off”. A Classic. Aphex Twin – Windowlicker Much more grand than the previous Aphex effort, and damn funny too. Windowlicker is almost a short movie, at about 10 minutes in legnth and the song only being over 6 minutes. The first few minutes center around two black guys trying to find girls, cue much funny banter and arguing until the biggest limo you’ve ever seen comes along and out of it steps Mr Aphex (a dancer with a latex Aphex mask on ofcourse). Here he changes all the girls appearance to look like himself, and begins to dance like a crazy bastard. It’s the editing that shines through here and is what amazed me when I first saw it (besides the genius track), every beat and noise that spills out of the song matches something that is going on on the screen. This will get a lot of laughs for years to come. Portishead – Only You A lot more laid back than the previous three, but it’s still unmistakable Cunningham. Shot in a strange dream like underwater style, the video matches the slow and eerie song perfectly. The editing and movment of the people in the video matching the beat of the song always brings a smile to my face. Plus as usual, Cunningham makes great use of widescreen, giving everything an epic and grand feel. There’s not really a lot to say about this vid, because like I said its a lot less outlandish and more laid back, still great to watch though. Madonna – Frozen Cunningham himself has called this his fleeting stay in the mainstream, although don’t let that put you off becauase its still a fasinating video and in my opinion one of Madonnas best songs too. You’ll no doubt have all seen this video at some point or another so a description would be a tad pointless, but the visuals on offer suit the mood of the song perfectly, so juch so that you can only think of the video whenever you hear the song afterwards. Leftfield – Afrika Shox No doubt some people will find this video a little unsettling, featuring a man who seems to be under a voodoo curse running around New York falling to pieces, as his arms and legs seem to shatter like ice whenever he stumbles or falls.. At one point as his hand breaks away a gentleman asks if he “needs a hand” so the usual dark humour is there in full affect. Afrika Shox is also probably the best song from Leftfield’s Rythym & Stealth album, featuring Afrika Bambata of vocals. Squarepusher – Come On My Selector It’s always a toss-up between this and Windowlicker when I try to name my favourite Video or Sir Cunninghams. This is probabaly his most hyper and kinetic video yet, set in a home for mentally hanicapped children in Japan and featuring a girl and a talking dog running around avoiding balled burly sercurity guards/nurses. This video shows off the editing skills once again, mainly during the segment where the girl is fighting with one of the guards and then quickly cutting to the dog biting the other guards foot, every sound from the insane song matching the visuals perfectly. Squarepusher himself Tom Jenkinson turns up at the beginning in a small but funny cameo on a Japanese TV show, calling the host a “total prick” when asked how he plays all the instruments at the same time. Genius. Bjork – All Is Full Of Love Another of Cunninghams more well known videos, showing off his design skills with robot technology. Featuring two robot Bjorks embracing in a passionate kiss after being constructed. Very strange and avante garde in some ways, and very slow moving compared to most of his works, but that’s because of the mood of the song, and as usual the video matches it perfectly. Other features on the disc are. Making Of All Is Full Of Love – Only a few minutes long with behind the scenes footage and interviews with Cunningham & Bjork. Other Work Monkey Drummer Video Installation – I was a bit dissapointed that this isn’t the full Monkey Drummer movie (Although it doesn’t label it as an excerpt, I always thought it was longer), as I’d been waiting to see it since it was first announced, but still a little is better than nothing. This is a truly bizarre piece of film making, it features a creature with a monkeys head and human limbs playing drums along to the Aphex track “Mt Saint Michel/Saint Michaels Mount” from Drukqs. Hurts my brain to think of how he did this, but its one of the highlights of the disc for me. Flex Video Installation – Once again, not the full thing. But that may have to do with the fact that it contains a photogenic cum-shot somehwere in the movie, BFFC would have loved that. Once again the soundtrack to this dark and nightmarish short is by Aphex Twin. It’s quite hard to make out what’s going on (if there is any hidden message here), a naked man and woman wrestling/shagging/beating the fuck out of each other to the noises of the sporadic soundtrack, would have been nice to have the full thing. Another interesting note is that the menu of the disc quickly shows footage of Flex that isn’t even shown in this excerpt, bastards. Mental Wealth – Playstation TV Commercial that many of you may have seen, featuring the young girld with the strange alien shaped head. Photocopier – Never Seen Levis Commercial Engine – Nissan Commercial which has music by Boards Of Canada Windowlicker – Bleeped Version – Just the Windowlicker vid with all of the swearing bleeped out. If you go to the trailer section you can find the classic advert for Druqks which Cunningham made, featuring Chris himself in alien prosthetics, it never fails to disturb the people I’ve shown it to, it got banned from MTV after one showing. It’s labelled on the dvd as a trailer for “Rubber Johnny” from Warp Films, so if that means it’s going to be developed as a feature, then Christ I can’t wait for that. Apparently the advert is just a snippet of a music video, but that’s just a rumour. To top it all off we have a brilliantly put together 52 page booklet which features interviews with Cunningham about his thoughts on each of his videos. Oh and the image quality on the video's is top notch, as you would expect considering Cunninghams sharp digital style. Although there are some things missing here and there, like his videos he made for The Autuers and Placebo (even though they are shown on the menu animations for some reason), this is still a fine package and I would recommend it to anyone who likes fresh new filmaking. |
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| The Work Of Director Chris Cunningham DVD By Yodasnoog |