From MTV to Hollywood

In the era when MTV reached full cultural domination, music videos served as petri dishes for experimentation, allowing up-and-coming auteurs to hone their boundary-pushing styles before unleashing them on the big screen. Directors who cut their teeth finding a cinematic language for hip-hop, indie, and pop acts went on to envision some of the freshest, most thrilling and even avant-garde movies released around the turn of the century. Kinetic, audacious, and hyperstylized, these Y2K-era touchstones from filmmakers like David Fincher (SE7EN), Spike Jonze (BEING JOHN MALKOVICH), Michel Gondry (ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND), and Hype Williams (BELLY) rewired the possibilities of visual storytelling.