the director's label series: mark romanek
an interview with the video director
by ryan boudinot



08.25.05

the director's label boxed set, vol. 2 canonizes the works of four directors who have left an indelible mark on the world of music videos. while the first boxed set in the series set the bar high for stunning visuals and inventiveness, the new set promises to introduce the world to four new auteurs who have each established a distinctive body of work. amazon.com dvd editor ryan boudinot spoke with mark romanek about photography, film, and the impossibility of creating a video for"stairway to heaven."

amazon.com: what was your breakthrough into music video directing?

romanek: if i had to define an early opportunity as a breakthrough for me, i suppose it would have to be back in 1989 when i was given a chance to direct a video for robyn hitchcock. the song was called "madonna of the wasps." the video doesn't look so terrific now, but at the time, it was very well received. it went into fairly heavy rotation on mtv.

amazon.com: i sense a familiarity in your work with photographers like joel peter witkin and nan goldin. how is the influence of still photography different than the influence of other filmmakers?

romanek: i think i'm just strongly attracted to provocative, interesting imagery. whether its moving or still doesn't really matter to me. i'm fascinated by how a photograph or an image in a film conveys information, emotion, subtext. i'm continually intrigued by the mysterious mechanism that makes one image resonant or complex and what makes another image one-dimensional or shallow. that said, the influence of certain filmmakers work is probably more layered--their rhythms, the way they instruct their actors to behave, the way they use light and music, the way the shots go together, etc. there are more variables to orchestrate in film.

"i'm fascinated by how a photograph or an image in a film conveys information, emotion, subtext. i'm continually intrigued by the mysterious mechanism that makes one image resonant or complex and what makes another image one-dimensional or shallow. " -- mark romanek

amazon.com: what music video directed by someone else struck you as so fantastic that you wished you had directed it?

romanek: the first one that comes to mind is a video david fincher did for iggy pop for a song called "home." the video was filmed in 16mm black & white on the streets of l.a. at night. the entire video was lit exclusively by old carbon arc lightning boxes, the kind that was used for the old hollywood horror films. it was such a simple, dramatic idea. i stole that idea outright in a video i did for nine inch nails called "perfect drug." the other one that always comes to mind is spike jonze video for wax for a song called "california." it consisted of a single, uninterrupted, extreme slow-motion take of a man on fire running to catch a bus. at the end of the video, we realize that we are seeing this burning, running man from the inside of a passing car and that a little girl was watching the whole thing from the back seat with this impassive expression. to me, that video is making the fullest use of the medium as an art form. it's everything one could ask for in a short music film. i love a simple, original idea that's well executed.

amazon.com: jay-z provides some commentary for your video for "99 problems" and mentions that the production took awhile for you to get it exactly how you wanted it. i'm curious how your vision for this video evolved.

romanek: well, the vision, as you call it, came pretty quickly. jay said he wanted to film in and around brooklyn's marcy houses where he grew up. this brought to mind all the new york street reportage photography of the '40s, '50s, and '60s, which is my favorite school of photography. so, i immediately asked him if i could shoot the video in black and white. he said, sure. so, off i went. the shooting went pretty smoothly. the thing that he's referring to in the commentary, the thing that took some time, was the editing. i came back with over twelve hours of footage and my regular editor, robert duffy wasn't available. i have a real short-hand with duffy, so i was very worried about working with someone new. i tried cutting the video with three different editors, and it just wasn't working out. by now, the video was about six weeks late and jay was getting pretty annoyed with me. i took so long with these other guys that duffy became available again. i began cutting with him from scratch, and the footage started to come alive. when i finally delivered a cut to jay he was really happy with it and his anger with me seemed to evaporate. it all ended well.

amazon.com: what films or dvds have you enjoyed as of late? what about books?

romanek: i am a big fan of the films of the brothers jean-pierre and luc dardenne. they make deceptively simple, neorealist films of great sensitivity and power. conversely, i'm also a huge fan of pixar. their attention to detail and their ability to create brand-new images and experiences for audiences is really inspiring to me. they're also tremendously witty and have great taste. though, i don't think i'd want to make an all-cgi film myself. i made a commercial once that way and found it an unbelievably tedious process.

amazon.com: are there any songs--contemporary or otherwise--that you can't help imagining a video for? how would you approach a video for this song?

romanek: you know, music is such an important part of my life, i try to just enjoy it and turn off that video-director part of my brain. sometimes ideas pop into my head while i'm listening, but i try to discourage that approach to enjoying music. i try to keep separate the work music and the music i listen to for pleasure. that said, they do often overlap. there are certainly artists that i would love to work with that i've not worked with yet: radiohead, björk, bob dylan, tom waits, iron & wine, the white stripes, etc.

amazon.com: pretend it's 1971 and led zeppelin approaches you to direct a video for their new single, "stairway to heaven." what would this video look like?

romanek: wow. that's a thought experiment that i'm not sure i can engage in. millions of people all over the world have conjured imagery in their own heads for a classic song like that. anything i could come up with would just piss people off. it's the music-video equivalent of a suicide mission.

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