#brook linder

[nofatclips]

Astonished Man by Thao & The Get Down Stay Down - Directed By Brook Linder

[live-and-die-in-la]

The field team did an excellent job. So many gorgeous shots.

John Mulaney Presents: Everybody’s in LA.

[theageoftheunderstatement]

Brook Linder’s Interview about the making of the MV of Body Paint

Via Directors’ Library, October 2022

Brook, my first question has to be about the particular images you have created for this video and their connection.

This video was a collaboration between myself, Ben Chappell, Alex Turner, and the band, but I came at it from a very specific viewpoint:

Body Paint is very much about visualizing the process of filmmaking and specifically the creation of symbolic imagery (and where that process can fall apart). There is a code to be deciphered and everything has a specific meaning, but mostly it’s the code-making itself that’s on display.

I have a background in editorial and I’m interested in edit patterns and delivering pieces of visual information that can take on different meanings depending on context (and that context itself can change over the course of a piece). Things widen out, contract, and widen out again.

Considering the nature of the piece, I’m intrigued to ask what relationship this video, or elements from it, have with your previous work.

I worked for the better part of a decade as an editor on all kinds of pieces (documentaries, narrative films, music videos, commercials), so I spent a lot of time thinking about the process and power of editing. Meaning can be imbued in many ways, and audiences get smarter and smarter all the time. I think the modern viewer is very sophisticated and can follow an idea with only a sliver of data.

Earlier this year I made a video for ambient artist Rich Ruth of Third Man Records called ‘Older But Not Less Confused’. This was an experiment, creating a mosaic from cars on a highway interchange and the people inside those cars. The images have little power on their own but set next to each other against the backdrop of a hundred little vehicles a larger, stranger picture begins to form.

After that, I completed a narrative/documentary hybrid on the process of editing called ‘Time Code’. The film is about an editor struggling to manufacture a narrative from scraps of footage for an elusive pop star. Throughout the piece, as the editor fails to construct a film, they begin to re-edit the piece in real-time and we watch the scramble to find meaning. I badly, badly wanted to submit this to Directors Library but I lost my nerve. It’s a very personal film, and from the conversations I’ve had with other editors that reached out after viewing it, I think it’s personal for them too. Shared editorial trauma, maybe.

Visually, the origins of ‘Body Paint’ go back to 2014, when the director of photography Frank Mobilio and I made another music video, ‘True’, for a band called Operators. We were chasing the tone of the paranoid Alan Pakula/Gordon Willis collaborations (The Parallax View, All the President’s Men, and Klute). I think we achieved that look but the real breakthrough came in the edit, where I found the more I stripped the context away the more powerful the individual shots became.

For my other collaborators, especially Ben Chappell and Alex Turner, their film knowledge and intention are very deep, and very extensive. They came with a specific tone and creative and our worlds blended pretty effortlessly. We had a great time sending links back and forth.

Can you tell us what shooting on film means to you, and perhaps some of the working methods you have or favorable results you aim to achieve over working digitally?

Ben and Alex are big advocates of film and using the old ways. The work they’ve been doing for Arctic Monkeys is exclusively on film, and they’ve built a visual world over years working together. That is obviously a very intimidating circle to be invited into. Frank and I are not so intense about film – we’ll shoot on almost anything – but we started to lean into it conceptually, building the idea and myth of film into the piece. Beyond anyone’s individual preference, shooting on film became absolutely necessary because it was inextricable from the concept of the piece itself.

Ektachrome was very important to Ben and Alex, and we took on that challenge somewhat begrudgingly as shooting it inside is no easy deal, but it really has a mythic quality to it. I was dead wrong, basically. It looks like the thing we’ve been chasing forever. They were right.

What are you reading at the moment?

I am fighting my way through Don DeLillo’s ‘Underworld’, and it’s totally the coolest thing I’ve ever experienced this side of Libra and at the same time so intimidating (it’s a brick). I’m halfway through it. Though he hasn’t made a film DeLillo is absolutely a filmmaker, no doubt. He knows too much.

All the DeLillo’s I’ve read (just a handful) deal with film and moving images in some way, but ‘Underworld’ has this really choice passage about a murder caught on tape:

And there is something about videotape, isn’t there, and this particular kind of serial crime? This is a crime designed for random taping and immediate playing. You sit there and wonder if this kind of crime became more possible when the means of taping an event and playing it immediately, without a neutral interval, a balancing space and time, became widely available. Taping-and-playing intensifies and compresses the event. It dangles a need to do it again. You sit there thinking that the serial murder has found its medium, or vice versa – an act of shadow technology, of compressed time and repeated images, stark and glary and unremarkable.

Maybe the victim’s a chump, a sort of silent-movie dupe, classically unlucky. He had it coming in a sense, for letting himself be caught on camera. Because once the tape starts rolling it can only end one way. This is what the context requires.

The more you watch the tape, the deader and colder and more relentless it becomes. The tape sucks the air right out of your chest but you watch it every time.

[alexstorm]

Thoughts on the bew music video ? I thought this one looked way more professional but I could be wrong, what do you think?

I just checked, it's another white male director but he can't be older than Alex. Nabil really was the exception, eh? The connection came probably through Miles since he did videos with him. But also fucking Nine Inch Nails!

If anyone's interested:

[antronaut]

The Artist As Producer, Quarry, Thread, Director, Writer, Orchestrator, Ethnographer, Choreographer, Poet, Archivist, Forger, Curator, and Many Other Things First.

[jetskisonyourmoat]

In a perfect world the Monkeys ‘doc’ would be like 10 hours of raw uncut footage of the band just doing whatever.

[soovermyself]

Excuse me lady, who gave you the right to look this good?! 🥵😍

Slaying at Fashion Week on September 8, 2023 in NYC 🤩

[laderniereseancedecedrique]

GOLDFINGER (1964)

James Bond enquête sur un milliardaire, Auric Goldfinger, pour une simple mission de surveillance. Mais l'adversaire va être cruellement sous-estimé et rien ne va se passer comme prévu.

[byrnedavid]

And I’m keeping on my costume And calling it a writing tool And if you’re thinking of me I'm probably thinking of you Body Paint – Arctic Monkeys; dir. Brook Linder

[sculpturesofanythinggoes]

I'm keeping on my costume and calling it a writing tool and if you're thinking of me, I'm probably thinking of you. There's still a trace of body paint on your legs and on your arms and on your face, still a trace of body paint on your legs and on your arms and on your face, still a trace of body paint on your legs and on your arms and on your face still a trace of body paint on your legs and on your arms and on your face

ARCTIC MONKEYS  Body Paint dir. Brook Linder

[jungleindierock]

Kings Of Leon - Mustang

Brook Linder directs the video for Mustang which is the first taste of music from the new Kings Of Leon album, Can We Please Have Fun, which is out 10th May 2024.

If you’re free tomorrow don’t make any plans We can go to sylvan park and kick over trash cans Love is all around me everywhere I turn Is that the smell of fall or the city burned

There’s a mustang in the city And it's calling me out Are you a mustang or a kitty What are you all about

There’s a golden globe in my office space A muscle magazine next to the toilet I’m getting big and strong just thinking about it And I can feel the heat of the water rise

There’s a mustang in the city And it's calling me out Are you a mustang or a kitty What are you all about

I saw em operating on the kid downstairs I could not be bothered to pretend to care I like to watch you eat in front of the camera And there’s a misty morning in your eyes

There’s a mustang in the city And it's calling me out Are you a mustang or a kitty What are you all about It’s just a mistake and a pity And its drowning the crowd Are you a mustang or a kitty Are you a mustang or a kitty

There was something amiss in your apology

There’s a mustang in the city And it's calling me out Are you a mustang or a kitty What are you all about It’s a mistake and a pity Dragging me down Are you a mustang or a kitty Are you a mustang or a kitty

[medium-observation]

DECEMBER RELEASE

Boop! The Musical - Chicago Tryout

December 3, 2023 - Medium Observation

Video | Matinée

Cast:

Jasmine Rogers (Betty Boop), Faith Prince (Valentina), Ainsley Anthony Melham (Dwayne), Erich Bergen (Raymond), Stephen DeRosa (Grampy), Angelica Hale (Trisha), Phillip Huber (Pudgy), Anastacia McCleskey (Carol), Lawrence Alexander (Ensemble), Colin Bradbury (Ensemble), Tristen Buettel (Ensemble), Joshua Michael Burrage (Ensemble), Gabi Campo (Ensemble), Daniel Castiglione (Ensemble), Rebecca Corrigan (Ensemble), Josh Drake (Ensemble), RJ Higton (Ensemble), Nina Lafarga (Ensemble), Morgan McGhee (Ensemble), Aubie Merrylees (Ensemble), Ryah Nixon (Ensemble), Christian Probst (Ensemble), Ricky Schroeder (Ensemble), Gabriella Sorrentino (Ensemble), Brooke Taylor (Ensemble)

Notes: Nice video from the second week of previews and Version 3.0. Some scenes are majorly wideshot due to the nature of the show, along with usher activity. Some washout can be seen at times but it's not too bad.

NFT DATE: June 6th, 2024

Screenshots: https://flic.kr/s/aHBqjB5Cro

Video is $20

Six - Second US National Tour (Boleyn)

November 19, 2023 - Medium Observation

Video | Matinée

Cast:

Cassie Silva (s/b Catherine of Aragon), Zan Berube (Anne Boleyn), Aryn Bohannon (s/b Jane Seymour), Terica Marie (Anna of Cleves), Taylor Pearlstein (s/b Katherine Howard), Courtney Mack (t/r Catherine Parr)

Notes:

Excellent video of a fantastic group of alternates and Courtney's unexpected final performance as Parr!

NFT DATE: December 1st, 2024

Screenshots: https://flic.kr/s/aHBqjB3Ye3

Video is $20

Mrs. Doubtfire - First US National Tour

November 16, 2023 - Medium Observation

Video

Cast:

Rob McClure (Daniel Hillard), Maggie Lakis (Miranda Hillard), Giselle Gutierrez (Lydia Hillard), Cody Braverman (Christoher Hillard), Emerson Mae Chan (Natalie Hillard), Aaron Kaburick (Frank Hillard), Nik Alexander (Andre Mayem), Romelda Teron Benjamin (Wanda Sellner), Leo Roberts (Stuart Dunmire), David Hibbard (Mr. Jolly/Ensemble), Jodi Kimura (Janet Lundy/Ensemble), Alex Branton (Ensemble), Jonathan Hoover (Ensemble), Sheila Jones (Ensemble), Julia Kavanagh (Ensemble), Marquez Linder (Ensemble), Alex Ringler (Ensemble), Lannie Rubio (Ensemble), Ian Liberto (s/w Ensemble), Lauryn Withnell (Ensemble), Julia Yameen (Ensemble)

Notes:

Near perfect capture of the tour! Some washout is seen in wideshots due to primary robs doubtfire outfit being so Bright.

NFT DATE: June 6th, 2024

Screenshots: https://flic.kr/s/aHBqjB3Z7Y

Video is $20

Frozen - First US National Tour

November 29, 2023 - Medium Observation

Video

Cast:

Caroline Bowman (Elsa), Lauren Nicole Chapman (Anna), Erin Choi (Young Elsa), Annie Piper Braverman (Young Anna), Jeremy Davis (Olaf), Dominic Dorset (Kristoff), Collin Baja (Sven), Preston Perez (Hans), Jack Brewer (Oaken), Evan Duff (Weselton), Tyler Jimenez (Pabbie), Renée Reid (Bulda), Kyle Lamar Mitchell (King Agnarr), Katie Mariko Murray (Queen Iduna), Natalie Wisdom (s/w Head Handmaiden), Jack Brewer (Bishop), Kate Bailey (Ensemble), Kristen Smith Davis (Ensemble), Jason Goldston (Ensemble), Natalie Goodin (Ensemble), Zach Hess (Ensemble), Adrianna Rose Lyons (Ensemble), Alexander Mendoza (Ensemble), Nick Silverio (Ensemble), Daniel Switzer (Ensemble), Peli Naomi Woods (Ensemble), Michael Allan Haggerty (s/w Ensemble), Jessie Peltier (s/w Ensemble)

Notes:

Absolutely gorgeous video of this tour! Lots of wideshots and close ups.

NFT DATE: June 6th, 2024

Screenshots: https://flic.kr/s/aHBqjB5mqB

Video is $20

Videos can be purchased through me at mediumobservationtrading@gmail.com

[depressedraisin]

fun fact i discovered today that punched me in the face: brook linder of body paint mv fame was also the director of the loaded mv

[bandomgay]

body paint (2022) dir. Brook Linder

[theageoftheunderstatement]

mdb1stac: Body Paint. 2022. . First time I focussed on 16mm film. This sequence was shot by DOP Frank Mobilio. Directed by Brook Linder and the creative direction as always by Ben Chappell. Dan Lobo-Pires of DLP films provided the E-trike, Ronin2 and rider to keep a perfect circle around the set. Charlotte Croft was my ever trusty loader and Louise Tse provided solid back up as our trainee.

[musicandotherstuff]

Behind the scenes of the making of the Body Paint videoclip

📸: Brook Linder