When Michael Jackson was alive, he made what he liked to call ‘short films.’ Mini movies that took you on an adventure. A visual representation of the narrative portrayed in his timeless music. Now that Michael Jackson is no longer with us, his Estate, record label, directors and choreographers make ‘music videos’ – a term Jackson refused to use for his visual artistry.
“In my opinion it has to be completely entertaining and have a linear sense of continuity,” expressed Jackson regarding his short films during a 1999 interview with MTV. “I like having a beginning, a middle, and an ending where you can follow a story and it not just be a collage of images. And sometimes that’s great too, but it depends on what vision the director has.”
Today, the music video for Jackson’s “Love Never Felt So Good” featuring Justin Timberlake was unveiled. Directed by Rich Lee – who has worked with the likes of Alicia Keys, Eminem, will.i.am and Matchbox Twenty to name just a few, and choreographed by Rich and Tone Talauega – who worked with Jackson numerous times throughout his career and now work with Cirque du Soleil on their MJ shows, the video serves its purpose.
Above: Music video for Michael Jackson’s “Love Never Felt So Good” featuring Justin Timberlake, from the ‘XSCAPE’ album.
It’s reasonably well-made. There are a few sloppy moments in the choreography and editing could have been tightened up, but overall I find it enjoyable to watch. A bittersweet tribute to the King of Pop set to a 34-year-old song he’d likely have never wanted us to hear.
After a hugely successful response on radio and iTunes, resulting in the track debuting at #20 on the Billboard Hot 100 last week, the video should serve as an effective way for Epic Records to get their foot in the door with music television stations like BET and MTV. The video has also been made immediately available on Jackson’s official VEVO channel. This should essentially secure the track a few extra weeks at the top end of the charts, with streaming statistics impacting the overall chart positions of singles. With 101,000 digital downloads sold this past week, on top of the 80,000 sold the week prior, the “Love Never Felt So Good” single sits at #22 on this week’s Billboard Hot 100. It was the 6th most downloaded song in the U.S. this past week, one of the most streamed tracks in the world, and is currently at #5 on the U.S. iTunes singles chart.
While I do enjoy the end result, and have watched it four times already, I feel this has to be where these kind of music videos end. No more compilations of fans dancing around to Jackson’s music with the same old snippets from his existing short films spliced in. In my opinion it’s time to be a bit more adventurous and make a really unique, cinematic piece. Perhaps they could bring someone like Spike Lee in to direct a video for “Do You Know Where Your Children Are”, or do something similar to Madonna’s “Get Together” music video (see below) for a track like Jackson’s “Slave To The Rhythm”. Step outside the ‘safe’ box.
Above: Madonna’s “Get Together” video; compiled from live performance footage and digitally edited/re-imagined. She was on tour at the time and was not able to personally film a video for the song.
I personally find the “Get Together” video slightly bland and lifeless, but that’s because I am not a huge Madonna fan and she’s not exactly giving an electrifying performance in the source footage used for the music video. Michael Jackson, on the other hand, gave nothing but electrifying performances for 40 years. With the right vision and execution they could really do something special with footage of Jackson performing live on tour. They could also do an animated video in the style of Daft Punk. Britney Spears also did a decent animated video for “Break The Ice” in 2008. Regardless, in my opinion, whatever they do next needs to be re-imagined in a way that’ll not only make the visuals fresh and entertaining to the casual viewer, but to the longtime MJ fan as well. After all, how many times have we seen that footage of Jackson grabbing his crotch on the roof of the car in the “Black Or White” short film? Enough!
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I never understood why they have such hard time making something worthwhile.
The first thing I would have done after Michael passed away, was to commission a very high quality animation/CGI of him.
Then anytime I released new music, I’d produce videos with the exact same MJ character in them, just set in a different story and environment. Additional animated pieces could be made of him for appearances in commercials or “live” performances at award shows. You could dress him up in the brilliant Light Man suit for half of the live gigs to cut down production costs (less detailed animation is cheaper).
The idea could really go far and beyond. For example, the short films for each single could actually constitute installments in an animated series. So for the album Xscape, the story could start happily with him and a woman shown madly in love (Love Never Felt So Good). We end, of course, with “to be continued…”.
Next video would explain there was no happy ending to this story, and the love was never meant to be. We’d see him boarding a train to Chicago…
The next video could follow the woman protagonist in her childhood, helping explain her trust issues and some of the things she’d done to Michael. This is of course DYKWYCA, with MJ narrating this terrifying social commentary from a dark nook somewhere in the girl’s house… The video could end with him taking out a folded piece of paper from his pocket. We don’t get to see what it actually is.
The next video (Xscape) would reveal he was actually looking at his own drawing from the HIStory album booklet. A scared, helpless baby Michael, crawled in a corner of a room. But this is no more. He’s the one in control now. “You be concerned about you, I can do what I want to”.
I would love this style of animation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Co0tTeuUVhU
You should make this video, Alec.
This video is a good commercial to sell the song. The dancing, the smiles, Justin Timberlake – all the pieces of a good commercial are there. Like most commercials, it’ll be firgotten once the song is off the charts. It’s not a work of art, like Michael’s films, nor it was supposed to be.
Another way of going about his that I thought about for a long time, would be to establish a Michael Jackson Short Film scholarship.
Film school students from around the world could compete by directing a short film set to a specific song. It wouldn’t have to be musical in nature.
The winner would get their work published as the official video to the song and would receive a grant/scholarship, for example full reimbursement of tuition fees.
They would get creativity that money can’t buy, and help talented, young people.
I just think it was a mistake to sign up with SONY. The video above is shite. No Story. Even the video clips are of footage we have seen before. can they not go through archive footage that has never been seen before.
I can not see SONY investing in a CGI video. Maybe the estate can but I doubt it.
If this is supposed to be viewed as a MICHAEL JACKSON VIDEO, it is completely off mark in every way. But if it’s to be seen as an extended commercial for a Sony product, It does indeed succeed at it’s propose.
I agree. It’s fine, but that should be it on the tribute videos. This is not something that people will want to watch again and again on MTV, it’s something they will watch once maybe twice but then go to the kitchen for a snack the next time it comes on. I can understand the tribute idea since this album is getting more attention than the last and no one probably saw the others than came out then, but that’s enough. I appreciate that JT did not try and out dance Michael or put on a show, he yielded the floor and that is cool. But after that, this feels like a WII dance game, not an innovative video.
I couldn’t agree more Damien! I’m getting so tired of seeing the same old thing again. I wish people like you and I were the ones in charge of MJ’s Estate. I feel like a few of the fans have a better idea of Michael’s grand vision then those who are in control do.
was Cry a short film masterpiece?
mj’s later music clips were very visually pleasing… But they were hardly story based. scream was nothing but him and Janet singing in space
(visually stunning, though)
was They don’t care about us a short film masterpiece?? No.. It was a great catchy clip that worked in the spirit of the song..
not all of mj’s pieces need to be thriller/bad/blackorwhite styling of music video.
the director and estate are dealing with the cards they have.. Promoting a man’s image and doing it in a tasteful way to please fans and casual viewers.
I like the video and it is way better than that ‘MICHAEL’ mess!
would love,to see a very well computer animated clip to something like ‘a place with no name. that song is #1 potential.
MJ got screwed on the Invincible Album. he wanted to make actual shortfilm type music videos but Sony wouldn’t work with him on it..and the prison verion of TDCAU though it didn’t exactly tell a story, it was visually artistic, as were all of the short films from HIStory. they were actually something worth watching over and over. something worth buying on DVD.
Michael wanted to do more short film type videos for Invincible but Sony refused him. Scream, while not telling a story, it WAS visually stunning and meaningful. As was the Original short film for TDCAU. the tribute type videos they’ve been giving us since he died are the same concept repackaged over and over again and it’s getting tired.
“the director and estate are dealing with the cards they have.. Promoting a man’s image and doing it in a tasteful way to please fans and casual viewers.”
No they are not. I do not buy into the fact that they have no archive unseen footage. Even if it was his classic videos from camera angles not seen before. But they just keep using the same old footage. They can also use CGI. MJs later videos may not have been the classics from the 80s but this video above is Bad. I mean any of us could have got a few mates and a canon 550 together with video editor package and made it. Hardly the kidn of work that Martin Scorse or Speilberg would put their name to. It does not surprise me. Most businesses just see the bottom line. Very few have the Steve Jobs type vision and doing over and above what the customer expects.
What I think…is that they need to think about animation. Michael branded himself and his name like Walt Disney did. Certain Images, like his logo’s and even the way he signed his signature, to the way you regognized him just by seeing his socks or his glove in the eighties, later it was the military style stuff, like you’d see his boots or his shinguards like in the HIStory promo..but thats me getting away from what i wanted to say…well I’m saying yeah CGI would be a good option too but I think animation should be a consideration for the people in charge of these things. right now the estate and sony/epic need to be looking at videos like aha’s take on me, or incubus’s drive, heck even some stop motion stuff like peter gabriel’s sledgehammer video idk…MJ was visually artistic as well as musically. he was the King of the “music video” so to tribute him with this sub par video junk instead of getting people in to make some kind of artistic short film is just not working. besides that we know the technology exists to animate MJ whether it’s old school animation or CGI….it’s been years now and for some reason it still hasnt crossed their minds… they’d rather spend their money making cheap a** bunk like they’ve been giving us i think… I wouldn’t be suprised if JT did that video for free cause whoever’s in charge of the videos on this thing is prolly too cheap to pay anyone…
Damien, I was wondering if you were going to get around to giving us a review of the album itself… i have my thoughts… like….in some songs they didn’t even consider Michael’s original compositions for the final product… like place with no name….. in the making of documentary they play the original and it’s obvious on the guys faces that they never even listened to anything but mj’s vocals on the track and they seem to be suprised their product was so different…i think they should have at least considered what mj was doing before they ripped his vocals and made it their own thing… it’s like they think his voice is alll that matters..like he wasn’t a composer in his own right, I’m not saying the track sucks he way they have it, but they should have let MJ’s original track have more say for itself before they decided it wasn’t worth using in any way…now with songs like love never felt so good there wasn’t much there in the first place, and i suppose im happy to have music to go along with the vocal now. but i guess after the Michael fiasco they thought it was all good as long as it was MJ’s actual Vocals…they forgot we respect him for his composing abilities also een if it was a sampled track Michael sampled the track because He wanted it that way…That said.. I do like alot of what I’m hearing on the album, Loving You is AMAZING. Chicago is great. I do like what Timbaland did with Blue Gangsta. I enjoy their version of Do You Know Where Your Children Are, but WHY is the demo on the album such a early version of it… they should have used the most complete version for each of these songs. to say they wanted to use the “original” recording is bull cause their “original” Love Never Felt So Good” isn’t the poor quality track I’ve had for years…they’ve cleaned it up… but yeah with DYKWYCA it feels like they are trying to misrepresent the song as something totally in demo form that they made into this great song, but it was already a GREAT song if they would have included the “Clint Eastwood” version of it instead of a BAD era scratch demo… idk they really needed to think about these things a bit more befre throwing this album out there… i feel like they jumped the gun a bit…if they’d worked on it a bit longer and thought it through a bit more it would have been so much better…
Sony or the Estate need to give James Cameron, director of Avatar a call. A place with no name could be a great CGI short film, with MJ taken through some portal to a Utopian place. Xscape (original version) is a contender too. I was even hoping they would make an extended short film for Dangerous as part of the Dangeous 25 release.
I say…get some actor doesn’t have to be incredibly famous or anything even…any sitcom 20-30 something could work.. it cuold even have a slight comedy edge to it like… janet’s we go deep video. the woman could be a mirage like or ghost native american woman, and transport the guy to a ghostly native american villiage where they’re all dancing and having a wonderful time. mj was all about tribal people and honestly i think the song must be about the california desert he’s singing about, being that’s where he grew up and lived most of his life. and it would also show you don’t have to go to another planet to find utopia. besides, mj could even make a small cameo in the end of the short film from black or white where he’s dancing with the native american tribe and our actor could kind of do a double take like george went does in the black or white video too. which would sort of pay homage to that moment in black or white in a cute way…
was talking about plae with no name btw…i forgot to say that..
u guess listening to it now it could be by the side of the road anywhere…. and a villiage wouln’t work i guess cause he says city… were there any native american cities???lol
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