Cimorene

I'm supposed to present a 3-minute emotionally affecting video today to the Finnish Art History class. Obviously I would use a vid.

But going through my recs & favorites, it was surprising how many could be confusing without at least a fandom-osmosis level of background knowledge.

My two first choices - that instantly leapt to mind, I mean - were Absolute Destiny's "Too Much Light in this Bar" (Life on Mars) and Luminosity & Sisabet's "My West Hollywood Lifestyle (Whatever)" (Angel), but when I watched them I realized they both demand pretty good oral English comprehension, not to mention some skills at a) regional accents and b) the gay scene (respectively). Not TOO worried, for the most part, about the Finnish classmates, but my Russian-speaking classmates are a problem there. (Russian diaspora people seem to be under a unusually strong cultural disincentive to practice foreign languages that makes them choose Russian anytime it's even possible, e.g. anytime another Russian-understander is in the room, and this shows in heavy accents and copious errors, even for most of the more competent speakers in my class). (Although Russia isn't as into dubbing vs subbing as France, haha.)

So reluctantly discarding the spoken-word songs, I went through recs, our media harddrive, and our collective memories, and even rewatched the Smashing Pumpkins and Muse theatrical trailers to Watchmen and the Seven Devils trailer to s2 Game of Thrones, which stood out in my mind as pro vids. But most of them suffered from the fandom osmosis problem: they don't require you to be in the fandom, but the references seem potentially lost if you aren't aware of the canon and what it basically is.

My finalists were both by obsessive24, Bachelorette (Buffy) and Candyman (Willy Wonka).

I found Bachelorette packed a huge punch when I first saw it and I immediately rewatched it about 6 times in a row, but as hard as it is to imagine not having heard of Buffy, I made the attempt, because there are like 18-year-old Finnish hipsters in my class, who could be either totally pop culturally savvy or just way too young and I have no way of knowing. I've only watched Buffy through season 6, and that one time, so I don't actually remember most of the detail ("Who's the evil priest? Wait, what are those army dudes? Who's that girl with the baseball bat?"), but I've got more than enough to follow the vid.

I'm hoping "Candyman" (which carries a warning for disturbing themes, is summarized 'smells like children' and uses footage from Requiem for a Dream) is blatantly disturbing enough - as are both Wonka films for that matter - to come across even if by some miracle someone hadn't seen either film. It seems unlikely that anyone could have not HEARD of them.

But the process has made me curious... what vids would you rec for outsiders? Can anybody think of any candidates immediately that shouldn't depend on background knowledge?


*I'll add links to this post when I come home, but I'm in a bit of a rush to get out the door now.