[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/v/LiXg_70rMeM]
The veteran British music-video director Nigel Dick can remember the shock he had when he watched Spike Jonze’s “Praise You.” Used to working with big budgets for the likes of Guns N’ Roses, Dick felt that Jonze, by making low-budget videos such as this one, was ruining it for the rest of them. (He said this out of love, not bitterness.) But even though the cost of “Praise You” was reportedly under $1,000, its genius is priceless. The fictional Torrance Community Dance Group go to a California movie theater and rock out to the track in front of stunned onlookers standing in line. (Jonze, who also plays the leader of the group under the pseudonym of Richard Koufey, didn’t ask permission from the theater.)
Not everyone gets the joke. One man actually turns off the record, at which point Jonze/Koufey instantly jumps up and hugs him in a manner that would have made the Marx Brothers proud. But the MTV Video Music Awards bestowed a Best Breakthrough Video and Direction award to the Torrance Community Dance Group, proving MTV got the gag. And even though it was nominated, “Praise You” didn’t win for Best Dance Video. What’s worse, the prize went to the now forgotten Ricky Martin’s “Livin’ la Vida Loca.”