Thirteen Smiths' recordings, half of them in a club with a live audience. These alternate with five rock videos, two directed by Derek Jarman (Panic and Ask), two by Tim Broad (Girlfriend in a Coma and Stop Me...), and one by Paula Grief and Richard Levine (How Soon Is Now?). It concludes with Jarman's short film, "The Queen Is Dead," with a three-song soundtrack. The rock videos, particularly Jarman's, are filled with multiple and superimposed images, changing tints, and little narrative coherence; they get their pace from the music's rhythm. Androgyny, dancing children, belching smokestacks, graffiti, angry young men, a waif in a cap: collages of modern alienation.
Direction
Jarman's 'Panic' and 'Ask' — pure avant-garde pop.
Cinematography
Superimposed images that feel like memory itself.
Production
'The Queen Is Dead' short film — three songs, zero chill.
Director
Derek Jarman
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
This compiles the only official Smiths video releases during their actual existence — the band famously avoided promotional videos until Jarman convinced them.
Derek Jarman shot 'The Queen Is Dead' short on Super 8 in his own garden and local wastelands, essentially for pocket change, creating the band's most enduring visual legacy.
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