![]() How Michael Jackson's Thriller changed music videos for ever . Seemingly unaware of the time difference, Jackson had called at 2am UK time and the sleepy director had to feign knowledge of the song, which he hadn't heard. Jackson, for his part, hadn't seen Landis's films Animal House, The Blues Brothers or Trading Places; he wanted Landis because of An American Werewolf in London. Landis said he would do the video if it could be a short film, and Jackson embraced the idea. ![]() The 1. 3- minute film that resulted changed the music video for ever, becoming less a promo clip than a cultural phenomenon. Even now, Kirsty Wark can perform the Thriller dance on Newsnight as a Halloween joke, and everyone gets it. Thriller was an event even when it was being shot in October 1. Marlon Brando, Fred Astaire, Rock Hudson and Jackie Kennedy Onassis all turned up on set, and Eddie Murphy, Prince and Diana Ross were spotted at the private premiere on 1. November. Thirty years ago this week . To be eligible for the Oscars, it needed a week- long theatrical release, so Landis arranged for it to open, bizarrely, for Disney's Fantasia at a single cinema in LA. And then, at midnight on 2 December, after weeks of trailers and hype, MTV showed it to the world. Thriller sealed MTV's reputation as a new cultural force; dissolved racial barriers in the station's treatment of music (though MTV has always denied they existed); revolutionised music video production; spawned the . The big turning point was Thriller. The Thriller video sent album sales into orbit, with Jackson's label Epic reportedly shipping a million copies a week in its immediate aftermath. Nevertheless, the Thriller video was set to be so expensive . It was Landis's producer George Folsey Jr who came up with the idea of the making- of video, which could be sold to networks as bespoke content. MTV paid $2. 50,0. Showtime $3. 00,0. Jackson would take care of upfront costs, and the video was able to go ahead, with the label coughing up $1. When the documentary was released on VHS, selling for $2. Vaughan Arnell, who had videos on MTV in its earliest days, and has gone on to make 1. Robbie Williams and three for One Direction, remembers Thriller with some trepidation. Thriller was the biggest recording artist in the world at the time working with probably the biggest director and it was an amalgamation of the two talents. They made something that was so perfect for the early 8. It took videos to another level, but in my world and in the world of artists I was dealing with, it's almost like it didn't relate. It really opened our eyes to music videos as a creative form of film- making, and a potential career. Her 1. 0- year- old son recently learned the routines at a holiday kids' club in Turkey, reminding her of the huge impact it had on kids in the 1. Michael Jackson was a true humanitarian. He was listed in the 2000 edition of the Guiness Book of World Records for breaking the world record for the 'Most. One such kid was Spike Jonze, who was 1. When I started directing videos myself a few years later, it was like a touchpoint. I didn't have this thought intellectually at the time, but when I watch it now I realise that there's no reason for a lot of it; it's so free and loose. There's the car running out of gas and it's like a movie, then it just keeps going, as if they're saying: 'That'd be cool, let's do that.' Michael Jackson seems like this kid who loves music, horror films, special effects, makeup, zombies and wants all of those things in the video. It has that spirit to it that must have been contagious; it spoke to other kids. I just wanted to create something that would do justice to the song and I was excited about making, and I think Thriller was the same way. As Psy's Gangnam Style proved, films shot relatively cheaply and quickly, and which don't require pluggers, or for the artist to necessarily have an existing profile, can have a global impact comparable to Thriller. The rules have been rewritten, unleashing a new surge of creativity. Love it or hate it, labels are obsessed with it and it's here to stay. The flipside of all these interviews, sessions and phone footage is that it takes the heat off music videos, making the traditional performance video completely redundant. Ray Tintori, who did MGMT's Kids is really good, too. He's taking things to a whole new place. It's like he's disconnected from everything and everyone, and that's exciting.
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