Gettin' a handle on Mandler

I have covered Antonioni and the music video before. But once again, he's connected with Amerie, and I'll throw a few others into the mix this time, just to make it interesting.

I have to say, I've been loving some tracks off her latest, In Love and War. E.g., Dangerous, More Than Love and The Flowers. She's still bringing the go-go beat hard! Yesssss.

And while its actually one of the lesser tracks on the album, the single Heard 'Em All has got a music vid whose director studied with Antonioni at USC film school, Anthony Mandler.



Mandler also directed this Jay-Z music vid, which is a more obvious homage to Antonioni's Zabriskie Point:



And in his latest vid for Jay-Z, the film school student in Mandler comes out in a little nod to the opening credits of the classic Japanese film Kwaidan, with of shots swirling liquid like Rorschachs:



Macabre indeed, with the skulls (oh hello Damien Hirst) being another ostensible link to the ghost story subject matter of Kwaidan. And there's a bit of the beat in there that sounds like some of the film score work from Toru Takemitsu (he did the soundtrack for Kwaidan). Probably not part of the inspiration, but the tinniness of it, the nearly unbearble percussive wall, the eerieness of its repetition seems parallel (maybe its all in my crazy head!). Whatevs. Takemitsu is pretty great. Deserves his own post, but anyway, check out this doccie on him that I just watched. The alternate spareness and cacophony of his music is where its magic lies.

Mandler's production company is also a tribute to the Jean-Pierre Melville/Jean Cocteau collab Les Enfants Terribles. Melville isn't my fave, but anyone who loves the author of Moby Dick and Alain Delon always wins brownie points.

And while I can't say I like everything he's done, the fact that Mandler provides a link between some of the crunk R & B/hip hop I love (like this Omarion jam) and some of the cinematic work that I love, means he's worth consideration.