Civilization

Fatboy Slim and Christopher Walken. The two belong together as much as chocolate milk and olive oil. After all, Fatboy is one of Britain's top dance mixmasters and Walken is one of Hollywood's leading middle-aged bad boys. A collaboration between them seems as plausible as Laura Bush gyrating her way into a Britney Spears video. And yet, for Fatboy's "Weapon of Choice," they work together to create one of the year's freshest and most intriguing videos.

It is also one of the most unadorned videos in recent years, avoiding flashy sets and costumes, multiple storylines, and images of coifed and manicured musicians. A man dancing, that's all it is. As the video opens, we see a rather dejected businessman (Walken) sitting in a plush, yet lifeless, hotel lobby, reading a magazine. "Weapon of Choice," the latest cut from Fatboy Slim's CD Halfway Between the Gutter and the Stars, begins to fade in, and the man stands, jerks to his left with his entire body, and begins to dance around the lobby. It is a fantasy many of us have had, and some have fulfilled, to dance with abandon in an environment that screams for "civilized behavior." The man jumps on the furniture, kicking magazines across the room and dancing in a style that's an amalgamation of Twyla Tharp and the Nicholas Brothers. Eventually, he dances his way over to an elevator, rides up to the second floor, exits the elevator and immediately dives off the balcony, soaring through the lobby a la Peter Pan. After bouncing off the balcony walls and taking a few laps around, he pauses mid-air, in a Christ-like pose in front a large nature painting. Finally, he floats back to the ground, and as the music fades, returns to his seat and resumes his reading.

The simplicity of the concept, the fulfillment of the fantasy to lose control when you really need to relieve some of the tension in your life, is made more interesting by the casting of Walken as the businessman. The Oscar-winning actor is more known for his portrayals of corrupt men than for downhearted individuals, much less gravity-defying dancers. It violates our expectations to see the gloomy actor bounding across the screen, and so emphasizes the video's theme of unexpected behavior, causing the viewer to get caught up in the scene, captivated by the wonder of it. But if the choice of Walken is unexpected, it is not without justification. Like legendary actor Jimmy Cagney, Walken began his career as a "hoofer" before finding his niche as a Hollywood "tough guy." Film buffs and Walken fans will remember a little-seen 1981 film, Pennies From Heaven, in which the actor performs a searing, seductive dance, on top of a bar. His body is a little heavier and his joints seem a little stiffer now, but Walken can still move well, and his dancing ability will probably be what gets people talking about this video.

It might also be surprising that Walken is 58 years old (although he doesn't look it here). Fatboy and director Spike Jonze didn't choose to cast the usual attractive dancers, thrashing ravers, or even a young Hollywood bad boy. The fact that they chose a middle-aged man highlights the unexpected nature of his behavior, and underlines the timelessness of heart-felt dance. We may chuckle at the old man shaking it, but, secretly, we wish to be that lively and still able to "bump and grind" when we are his age. "Weapon of Choice" lets us know that the ability to join in the celebration of life exists at any age. All we have to do is get out of our chairs.

Naturally, any good dance number demands good dance music, and Fatboy Slim (a.k.a. Norman Cook) provides that. I wasn't familiar with his work before this video; having gotten heavier and stiffer myself, my knowledge of dance mavericks has waned in previous years. But if this selection is any indication of Fatboy's body of work, then there is good reason for his popularity. His collaboration on the song with "Bootsy" Collins of Funkadelic almost insures that it will be a hot composition. The track is layered with a combination of techno beats, but like any good dance tune, the beats here don't consume the song so that all the listener can hear is a pulsing tempo. They're interwoven with the vocals and other instrumentation. To be honest, I couldn't understand a word of the lyrics and can't seem to find a copy of them, so I have no idea whether they address the theme of the video, or, as is the case in many dance numbers ("Who Let the Dogs Out", "Don't Want No Short, Short Man," etc.), they are secondary to the mix. Regardless, the overall combination of music and choreography is enough to make this video worth watching. As a testament of the quality of the video, "Weapon of Choice" has been chosen as one of MTV's Buzzworthy Clips, and has been featured on such diverse stations as CNN and WTBS.

Most viewers might focus their attention on the partnership of Walken and Fatboy in the video, but it is director Spike Jonze who deserves much of the credit for it. Jonze is no stranger to the video format, having directed such critically acclaimed videos as the Beastie Boys' "Sabotage," Bjork's "It's Oh So Quiet," and one of Fatboy Slim's previous videos, "Praise You." Jonze further displayed his directorial skills in his feature film debut, Being John Malkovich, and his style for "Weapon of Choice" most closely resembles his work in that film. The low angle shots and dark lightning are reminiscent of the mood Jonze set in BJM, perhaps because we identify this businessman as an ordinary man in an unusual circumstance in the same way viewers did John Cusack's puppeteer in BJM.