Propaganda Music Videos and the Need for Creative Spaces
In 1983, Steve Golin and Sigurjón Sighvatsson were two recent film school graduates trying to figure out how they were going to break into the notoriously elitist and guarded world of film. After obtaining significant loans from the bank and friends in real estate the two partners were able to start up a little film production company of their own. This company was called Propaganda Films, and would specialize in the production of music videos.
MTV’s rise to prominence in the early 80's ushered in a new demand for music video content. There was a lot of opportunity to experiment with form and content in this space but, more importantly, there were a lot of jobs. In the beginning Golin and Sighvatsson’s mission was simple, a music video producer could expect to receive 15% of the music video’s production budget as profit. They needed earnings of $15,000 a month to keep the lights on, in other words, they needed to land jobs and produce $100,000 worth of productions a month. They quickly found they had a knack for this. They met their goal every month, at first barely scraping by, then, consistently hitting their target with ease, before finally consistently bypassing their rent comfortably every month. Their success lead to significant growth, they became so prolific that by 1990, the company was producing almost a third of all music videos made in the U.S.
There are a couple reasons this story is significant, the biggest being it is still relevant today. Nobody knows how to break into the film business, this feels more true than ever. There is no set career path, no keys to success, and a dearth of entry level positions. You can’t just rely on hard work nor pure talent, there seems to be a healthy and inherent amount of luck involved. Young people in the industry do not have it easy, graduating with a large amount of anxiety and debt. Young directors come out after years of training only to find it’s harder and harder to make a movie and financially support yourself. Writers are left in limbo, waiting by the phone for representation with a portfolio of scripts on their lap. Hopeful producers throw themselves into assistant positions at corporate offices and find themselves at a desk for 5 years at a time. Sometimes it feels like nothing is in your control. The outcome is a lot of talented but disillusioned and burned out creatives.
What Golin and Sighvatsson did in 1983 was identify an opportunity for themselves and other young collaborators to control their futures.
Music video as a mainstream and creative tool for storytelling was just starting to hit it’s peak. This was an unmapped territory that most established directors and producers didn’t feel the need to explore. So instead it gave young, unestablished directors a platform to exercise and create. There were no formal rules for what a music video had to look like, this freedom did wonders to spur innovation. Many artists used the medium to create and explore cinematic storytelling techniques that they would eventually refine and master in their feature films. The music video boom created a space where creatives could work on their craft, establish credibility, earn a living, and create community between talented artists. The list of young collaborators to came out of Propaganda Films include David Fincher, Spike Jonze, Michael Bay, Antoine Fuqua, Zack Snyder, Gore Verbinski, and Michel Gondry.
It’s been 35 years since Propaganda Films redefined the function of a music video. The medium has come far and continues to be a testing ground for technique and professional advancement. However, just as Golin and Sighvatsson in the 80’s, the next generation of filmmakers need a medium to make their own, a space that both beckons with opportunity and demands formalization.
Perhaps there is just such an opportunity, one which has sprung organically from the age of big data. One thing that always seems to remain true about the entertainment industry is if you want to reach an audience you have to be on the platform where your audience is on. Consumption is no longer one size fits all, film and television are being supplemented with content from YouTube and Twitch, watching on the go has increased rapidly thanks to mobile phone technology, more and more large conglomerates want get into multi-media. Soon Amazon will be joined by Facebook, Apple, AT&T, Twitter, Snapchat, and anyone else hoping to combine their vast reserves of data, traffic, and connectivity with narrative media content.
Just like the music video boom, there will soon be a very large demand for new quality short form content for companies like Facebook or Google. It is doubtful established heavy weights in the entertainment industry are going to jump from film or television into this abstract, millennial construct, so creation of the formal and story telling rules will fall squarely onto the shoulders of the next generation of creatives. Will the format resemble television, a larger story cut into smaller parts? Or film? Short films have long been a staple of the young indie filmmaker’s portfolio. Or will it be entirely different? It is inevitable that, as businesses continue to grow and change, the young generation is called upon to lead the charge into an uncertain future. What this space will look like down the line will largely be dictated by the early adapters who take risks, and create their own success. Who will be the Golin and Sighvatsson of the digital age?