It's a short film you can log on Letterboxd, so that's exactly what I did earlier tonight:
Since I can discuss this on Letterboxd and in past Spooky Seasons I’ve discussed cartoon shorts and Halloween safety instructional videos, why not discuss a music video which also works as a short film? This is despite the controversy surrounding the video’s director John Landis-for reasons most people likely know-nevermind the number and severity of the allegations against Jackson. “No comment” on all that turmoil except to say that the video, the song, and The King of Pop’s red/black ensemble are all all-timers.
The full 14-minute version is expertly done: the song, the dance choreography, the Rick Baker effects (whether they be the zombie makeup or a rather gnarly transformation that’s in essence a shorter version of what he did for An American Werewolf in London), the “rap” from Vincent Price*, the creepy settings-forest, abandoned house, cemetery-the atmosphere… I love it all.
The movie theater they filmed at-the Palace Theatre in Los Angeles-is thankfully still around and in fact recently held a Thriller event for charity. Between this and seeing multiple videos paying homage to Thriller (whether they be to advertise an event or just in tribute) it is not a surprise that the official upload on YouTube-originally made 15 years ago and in the meantime receiving a spiffy 4K upgrade-has now had over a billion views.
As it is the sort of horror I prefer to the “elevated” dogma that is inescapable and if you’re tired of the focus being on “trauma & grief”… at least this provides legit scares and the entire Thriller album is something I’ll love as I can divorce Michael the person from Michael the musician.
* Not the first time that Price appeared on record. 1975’s Welcome to my Nightmare from Alice Cooper doesn’t have Old Vincent “rap” but instead in the song Devil’s Food he delivers a soliloquy concerning poisonous spiders which dovetails into his increasing glee over the black widow—yes, that dovetails into the song Black Widow.
No comments:
Post a Comment