He is an American director, producer and actor who was born on October 22 1969 in Rockville, Maryland USA. His work includes music videos, commercials, films and television. He is best known for his collaborations with writer Charlie Kaufman including the 1999 film “Being John Malkovich" and the 2002 film "Adaptation", and for his work as director of the 2009 film “Where the Wild Things are”. He is well known also for his music video collaborations with Weezer, Beastie Boys, and Bjork. He was also a co-creator and executive producer of MTV's "Jackass." He is currently the creative director of VBS.tv. Jonze also is the part owner of skateboard company “Girls Skateboards” with riders Rick Howard and Mike Carroll.
In 1998 Jonze directed "Praise you" by Fatboy Slim, this was a Torrance Public Film Production from the album "You've Come a Long Way, Baby. The song was released on 4th January 1999 in the United Kingdom and on the 16th February 1999 in the United States of America. The genre of this song is Big beat and Alternative Rock. While the length of the album version is 5:23 minutes, the radio edit is shortened to 3:24 minutes. This would have been done because the song consists of a few lines being repeated over a beat and would eventually become less entertaining after a few plays. It was also shortened on the radio edit so that there is less time used up on the radio as they have certain time slots that they will have to follow by and they can’t afford to lose by having long songs. The record label of the UK song is called Skint and the US label is called Astralwerks. On the US billboard Hot 100 charts the song made 36 in the 1999 charts and in the UK it was number 1 on the singles charts 1999. Jonze stared in the music video with the dance with the fictional Torrance Community Dance group, the video shows them dancing to the song "Praise you". Jonze has also produced "The Rockafella Skank" but he was unable to work with him in the music video.
In analysis to this music video; this is unique with the effect to make it seem as though it was taken on the spur of the moment due to the hand held camera and having other onlookers in the background and of the side of the camera. The video its self makes bad dancers look good, as this was done deliberately to make it look more natural and not staged.The video was taken after Fatboy Slim's performance at the Mayan Theatre in LA. They filmed it outside a Westwood theatre with The Torrance Community Dance Group, theatre managers and the appearance of unscheduled bouncer's, as was a break dancing Michael Jackson impersonator (but he was cut from the video). This was all taken in one take under 10 minutes. The video is an expanded version of Spike Jonze's (Video Guru behind Weezer's "Buddy Holly," Beastie Boys' "Sabotage," and the Chemical Brothers' song called "Electrobank") video for "Rockafeller Skank". The video was filmed as joke showing a video tape of Jonze dancing on Hollywood Boulevard.
Spike Jonze has also worked with many other music artists in directing their music videos. Kanye West is another example where Jonze has co-directed the video with Kanye West. Whilst searching for this song I have found three different versions to this song, one of them being the official music video. I thought that it was unusual for them to create three different versions.
When searching for the music video, on youtube they say that this above is the official music video for flashing lights by Kanye West.
This song was released on November 22nd 2007 for Kanye West's Third album "Graduation". The song it's self was co-produced by Eric Hudson and featuring the R&B singer Dwele, as well as having additional vocals provided by Connie Mitchell from Sneaky Sound System. The genre is Hip hop / R&B with a length of about 3-4 minutes long. The record labels for this artist or song is by both Roc-a-Fella and Def Jam. The cover of the single was designed by a Japanese pop artist, Takashi Murakami. This video was co-directed by Jonze along with West and produced by Jonathan Becker and Joshua Greenberg from the Bucks Boys Productions.
In total three separate music videos were made for the song "Flashing Lights". The third music video was first unveiled for an audience of 200 guests at the Entertainment Weekly Grammy Awards after-party on February 10th, 2008. It was intended to be shown at BET on February 13th, 2008, but it was subsequently pulled from the schedule. West decided to premiere the video onto his official blog the same day. The first and official music video for "Flashing Lights" was filmed entirely in slow-motion and was set at dusk in the desert outside Las Vagas, Nevada. The woman shown is a playboy model, Rita. Kanye is shown tied up in the boot of the car. As the camera pans out, the woman get a shovel from the side of the car boot and it shows her repeatedly stabbing Kanye. This shot is not shown close up because it would be too gruesome for the viewers. The video then abruptly cuts to the words "Flashing Lights" written in red letters against a black background before ending over a minute earlier than the album version is the song.
The second video for the single leaked into the internet on May 23rd, 2008 casting the UK model Charlotte Carter-Allen as a young woman who becomes overwhelmed by the New York Nightlife. This version of the music video was listed number 2 on the Viral Video Charts on May 30th. The third video was voted as 11th best music video of 2008 by Rolling Stone and Pitchfork Media voted the same version as 15th best music video of the decade. Following these releases, West clarified on his official blog that he did not release two other videos worldwide on the internet. He had produced more than one version for common practice and only selected the one he was happiest with; the rest must have been leaked by someone else.
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