This March 11 is an important day for JA Bayona. The Spanish director will be in Hollywood pending whether any of the two nominations he has The Snow Society It becomes his first Oscar.
His review of the tragic accident that occurred in 1972 in the Andes with a plane full of young people who had to survive the high temperatures and lack of resources. 45 passengers, 16 of whom came out alive after 72 days of hell.
One more sample of the sensitivity that the director places in each of his projects and which has established him as one of the most admired professionals in the sector.
In this nervous weekend, we wanted to lighten the atmosphere by remembering his past as a producer of video clips for artists such as OBK, She dances Alone, rosary beads either Camela.
“When I started making films as a teenager I made the typical short videos, gore, with a lot of blood, and once, At the Film School of Catalonia I was able to start doing things that were a little more professional and that was where I started making video clips.”, he recalled.
OBK. You keep it up
When he took on this project he had just read The Portrait of Dorian Grey of Oscar Wilde. “I was fascinated by the novel, it seemed incredible to me,” she admitted. A story about the desire for immortality that fit perfectly with the electronic duo’s song.
“The funny thing is that later people talked about the song referring to the video clip“, he recalled about the weight that these images had, “we had created a kind of extension of the song.”
A video clip that received a Waves Award. “It was a bit of a reward for having been working with OBK and seeing your work recognized. It made it easier for me to work much more,” she admitted.
OBK. On the contrary
“They They had a very specific attitude and I think that the filmmakers did not understand what the group was.. They have an epic component, and they were poorly shot. You see Jordi in such a close-up shot that is a little epic and it looks ridiculous, he needs an epic realization,” he reflected on OBK’s videography.
“It’s a bit of what we try to take care of and think a lot about what references I could associate OBK with, like Pet Shop Boyseither George Michael either Depeche Mode that it was the world to which I was trying to bring them closer, a world to which they, a little, belong,” he added.
And that is what he did with this video clip that had as a reference to Anton Corbijn and Depeche Mode with black and white images and a sinister air that reminded us of their stage. Rapist.
Of course, the black and white thing was also a matter of hiding shortcomings. “That video clip was made with 200,000 pesetas and with a lot of imagination”, he admitted.
OBK. False morality
Bayona has never been one to literally translate a song into audiovisual format, has always tried to go further and it bothered him that there was such poor billing and lack of ideas in this sector.
The idea of False morality It came to him a year before making the video clip when Jordi gave him the demo of the song. “I wanted to make a story that is not what the song tells but what happens after the song. I was interested in seeing those characters 40 years laterwhen there is no longer an age difference and they can meet again,” he explained.
He related the video to the aesthetics of amazing stories of Spielberg.
OBK. Love me again
His way of approaching a video clip was the same as when he approached a short film. “Love me again is a parody, maybe people don’t see it at first glance. It comes from me watching a video clip of Robbie Williams which is so blatantly outrageous that I found it funny. The only thing missing is for Robbie Williams himself to come out and say, please, talk about me. I said, well, let’s laugh a little about that and that’s what the video is, an intention to frivolize about the frivolous,” he explained.
It was his way of claiming that You cannot resort to anything in a video clip to attract attention.
Camela. give me your love
“Developing a certain complicity with Camela is easy, there is no other group equal to which you can make video clips like you can do for Camela,” he admitted at that time that he was delighted with the duo’s sense of humor, “In Spain there are no groups with a sense of humor, the majority of groups with a sense of humor fall into the astracanada, which doesn’t interest me at all”.
With them I could create something with humor without falling into the most vulgar. This video clip, in reality, was that of Amor.com. “They changed the song about three or four days before filming. and it was in space because it was for Amor.com and it was a couple who knew each other online, he was on Mars and she was on Earth and they knew each other through chat. All the sets were set up and all the models were made and we turned it into a video in which a couple feels distanced because he works on Mars and she works on Earth. He sneaked in quite a bit at the end,” he revealed.
He recognized that in the world of video clips they worked with very small budgets. “We had to shoot on a set that was already set up, which was for a porn movie.“We changed three or four things and it was Dioni’s Mars house,” he said.
Camela. When love sets sail
The group originally wanted to make a pirate video clip because it had just come out. Pirates of the Caribbean, but he did not really fancy this topic and it seemed like something very complicated because it would require an approach and that is not easy. So, he proposed a western.
Raphael. Damn Goblin
“The best of Damn Goblin was working with Rafael, is an artist like the top of a pine tree. Hard-working artists, collaborators, you will find little of the stature of Raphael, who is a myth of Spanish music,” she assessed.
“The best thing was meeting him, the truth is, the video is another story”, he assured, and whoever wants to understand, let him understand.
Rosary beads. To the sound of the drum
With rosary beads She was clear that she knew what the thing was about, she is an artist who had worked in film and had controlled the language of the video clip. She had just filmed a film with AlmodĂłvar.
“I wanted a bright video and a quick montage and I, with my OBK videos, characterized myself more by being dark and relaxed with time, a time different from that of the video clip,” he recalled and admitted that The relationship between them did not start well because he told her that he did not like what he did..
They ended up understanding each other and both ended up happy with the result.
Alberto Comesaña. No kidding
“That No kidding entered into the realm of controversy and censorship, I still don’t understand it very well because, in fact, I have made videos that could be more objectionable”, he was surprised.
“No kidding MTV censored him because he broke all the rules they have about video clipsthe one with nudity, a dangerous attitude, flashes per second and a rule, which I don’t know what it is, but it intrigues me, which is the rule of fear,” he recalled.
She dances Alone. How we distribute friends
A video with animation parts that he made with Juanjo Saez, “one of my best friends and I admire him very much.” The girl duo liked their drawings and even “they ended up taking some of the props, they took the piano, the Christmas tree.”
In fact, Bayona recognized that one of the chapters of this video clip was the best thing he had ever done. It was the one that served as a farewell for the group.
They are some of the many that are on his resume. Lead director of OBK and Camela, then other video clips arrived such as The Alephof Nena Daconte, Facingof BunburyEdit either Disconnected of Keane. The last one he has done so far and which dates back to 2012.
