Misc. Film Fun – Two Music Videos that Tell Stories

The Australian electronic music group The Avalanches does some pretty groovy music videos. The visuals to their songs Frank Sinatra (2016), Subways (2016), and Frontier Psychiatrist (2000) are excellent — as are the songs. But the video to Since I Left You, the title track to their first album (2000), does a bit more than just offer good visuals: it tells a story, admittedly one that only truly becomes apparent (and bittersweet) during the last seconds. Directed by Rob Leggatt and Leigh Marling, the video won "Best Video" at the 2001 MTV Europe Music Awards. A blast from the past, so to speak.

The Avalanches —

Since I Left You:

Next up, a music video to wipe away all the wistful poignancy left behind by Since I Left You. "Mr. Oizo" is the pseudonym of French electronic musician and film director Quentin Dupieux, a man possibly best known as the director of the decidedly surreal (and bloody) love-it-or-hate-it horror comedy, Rubber (2010 / trailer), about a killer car tire with telekinetic powers. (For which, actually, "Mr Oizo" supplies some music.) 

Oddly enough, for his 2014 electro-release Ham, Dupieux / Mr. Oizo didn't do the video but, instead, called upon Eric Wareheim (whose oeuvre of numerous entertaining music videos also includes the oddly disquieting ode to twerking that is the video to Major Lazer's Bubble Butt [2013]). For Ham, Wareheim directed a violent ode to America's penchant for obesity and guns, and our greatest national holiday, Black Friday. And while Wareheim himself calls the video a nightmarish vision of what America might become, we at A Wasted Life would say that it is already an accurate reflection of today's national soul and the general appearance of Trump's nation. 
Starring John C. Reilly, of Life After Beth (2014 / trailer), the disappointing remake Dark Water (2005 / trailer), and Tale of Tales (2015 / trailer).

Mr. Oizo —
Ham: