Customer Reviews

Stan Ridgway's Holiday In Dirt

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

There is cult, there is obscure and then there's Stan Ridgway. For those of us who love his music but have never seen his videos, it is good to see not one but two DVD compilations on the market (the other being the excellent, career spanning "Showbussiness is My Life"). "Holiday In Dirt" is one of the best music DVDs around if you are interested in music videos as an art form on its own, linked with avant garde cinema and video art, as it was the case with bands such as The Residents or Devo (actually, Stan's DVD features two videos directed by collaborators of the aforementioned bands). All the films included here are excellent: the Barry Gifford pastiche "End of The Line" (where Ridgway ends up fighting with the director, as in Norman Mailer's "Maidstone"); the retro-futuristic black and white catwalk in "Brand New Special and Unique"; the First World War combats in "After The Storm"; expresionist computer animation in "Operator Help Me" ; faceless teenage gangs in "Garage Band'69"; and a ventriloquist dummy singing country... there's something for everyone here, but my favourite is "Beloved Movie Star Redux", a heartbreaking story of love and loss (and then again, you 'll see what I mean) shot like a real vintage silent film.

Plus, you get two vids from 1995 masterpiece "Black Diamond" (one of them, "Big Dumb Town", is one of the funniest and most disturbing satires of showbiz ever made) and, as a hidden bonus, the 1995 short film "The Drywall Incident", which features Stan the Man as himself (quite funny actually), some bad language and some NAKED women (so if you are under 17 you shouldn't even read this, as you might get sinful thoughts and go to hell!).

A must if you are interested in independent film-making, grown-up rock music, fascinating lyrics and free - thinking.

Stan Ridgway is an American treasure that like most will never be fully appreciated in his lifetime. So any opportunity to purchase one of his works should be jumped on immediately. This video (or set of videos) is a grab bag, some of my favorite songs have mediocre videos (Bing Can't Walk) and some of the songs that are so-so for me have great videos (Operator Help Me by the late great Jim Ludtke). But as the title of this review states buy it if only for the easter egg of The Drywall project and for the video that follows it Bel Air Blues.

I ordered this dvd being a huge fan of Stan Ridgway's. I am enjoying his music in addition to the 14 short films. Stan is even in the videos as himself and will promise to make you laugh. More rare songs by the artist himself, this is a great addition to any collector of Stan Ridgway. I'd recommend it to anyone that likes his music. The videos are short but very creative. I think this is a great idea for many who are trying to get started into the movie business first select a brilliant man like Stan and use his music to create a short video to match. Very fun and relaxing to watch. Thanks again Stan he is my all time favorite and I will be watching these videos in years to come.

This DVD is horrible. I heard the Holiday in the dirt Cd by the one hit wonder Stan Ridgway and thought it was'nt too bad. I thought this DVD would be creative indie videos to accompany the cd. WOW was I wrong. Most of these were torture to sit through. There were a few that were OK but for the most part most of these movies videos or whatever you call them were high school quality filmmaking. Most of these did not have anything to do with the story of the song and some were down right absurd. One starts out interesting with some cool effects but its like he ran out of ideas and the guy ends up in a disco roller rink as they zoom onto the disco ball it seemed like it was made for a different song, This was not a disco song! One a guy has a blurred out face just walking. Another one a guy has a gun. Toy guns now have an orange tip as this one did. Could they not come up with a better prop? The worst was After the storm. As the song plays these guys battle in WW1 uniforms. It had nothing to do with the song. It seemed like someone knew someone who owned a army surplus store and let them use uniforms it didn't matter that it had nothing to do with the song, another showed security camera footage from a parking garage and again had nothing to do with the song.Just overall a bad DVD. For something that cost only $7,000 to make the retail price seems a bit high. If you want to see some good videos accompanied by some great music try Amazon for Peter Gabriel videos. Very professional and even cost less