Face to Face with... Saman Kesh

By now you will have come up with your own conclusions about the action and events which unfold in Saman Kesh's new video for Placebo, Too Many Friends. It's hard to take your eyes off the footage as the new song plays out after a poolside incident takes and the ending uniquely challenges the viewer to a pop quiz about what they've just witnessed.

With that, we decided to probe the SKUNK director about the cool project and here he tells us how he got involved, the techniques he used to realise his vision and about picking his battles on set with Placebo.

How did you get involved in the Placebo project?

I was approached while shooting my short film, Controller. Joceline Gabriel (my rep), and John Moule (commissioner) came to me stating that the band was interested in collaborating with me on a trilogy of sorts - "What, somebody wants to work with me???"

They wanted three videos for three tracks… and for them to be somewhat tryptic. I wasn't very interested in doing a promo at the time due to being involved in something else… but they were very excited, and passionate about their ideas and messages – so, I couldn't help but also get excited.

After a month or so, I came to them with a trilogy idea and told myself "they’re probably gonna think I'm a fucking quack, but oh well, here it is, fellas". The trilogy consisted of three different analytical micro breakdowns, each in their own respective time periods and narrated by socially relevant individuals. After a couple weeks of discussion we got the green light on developing part three. So, I guess we'll be going backwards on that timeline…? Lol.

How developed was the idea when you begun working on it?

I will throw an arbitrary number of 75 per cent. It was pretty much what I pitched, but minus the "exact" context of events fleshed out. I tend to leave some blank spaces intentionally as I find the organic process of developing and evolving of ideas to better suit my workflow (which often scares the shit out of a lot of people)… but Brian, Stefan and Steven were very open minded and trusting about it.

Was you already a fan of the music and did that help or not?

Other than reputation and remembering the band’s popularity from my childhood to now, I can't say that I was very aware of the their image or music. However, I am now. They’re probably one of the best bands I have worked with… very supportive and nurturing of the creative process.

And tell us about the techniques you used to achieve your vision…

Ha ha. [That’s] such a fancy way of putting: "how the fuck did you get this shit done?" I'll take it… The techniques all came from the general goal of analysing the micro to deduce the macro. I wanted to explore details which easily get lost in common [mis]perception that may or may not be directly involved to how we live our lives.

- Phantom Camera. It always felt like god-like objectivity. An impossible way of looking at reality, which ironically is more realistic than what a human can perceive (i.e. what a hummingbird actually looks like in slow-mo). This allowed for spectacular photography, while showing people "what they missed." 

- Continuity. The mother of all mind-fucks. We didn't have a million dollars to rent a hundred Phantom cameras. So, having to remember exact placement of a body hitting the water, the orientation of a bottle as it smashes on someone’s head, and even which ass cheek was squinting upon being startled was not the sanest process. We were never perfect, but it all needed to be accounted for so the piece retained its objective nature throughout.

- Casting. I usually try to cast for interest and emotion and not aesthetic, but this was the piece that I wanted to cast "mahican" like perfection. The idea of our desires to be perfect, when we are in fact NOT perfect and far from it. This is mirrored in the "flawless" technology we use from day to day.

- Wardrobe. It was important for me to find a visual language for uniformity without being too THX or Brave New world about it. Since there are still many schools with dress code, I wanted to approach this analysis from prep-school kids. Also, this allowed for the "perversion" of some of the themes to stick out more since there are fetishes out there in the world using this type of clothing.

And what was the biggest challenge involved in shooting the video…

Picking battles. Because of my inability to "take it easy", all the moving parts makes it quite a cluster fuck to keep the crew’s sanity in order. Often times I have to limit the amount of information I tell people because it just confuses them. So, really, I guess it was about picking my battles: Hanging on to what really was important, and letting some of the other idea children die as a result of the battle of making moving images.

And was the band happy with the end product?

The band seemed quite happy. I think we teetered a bit of how much footage of the band should be in the video, but we all started to learn how much was enough. Actually, once the guys realised what I was trying to do more and more, the band started to fall in love with less and less footage of themselves and I eventually had to fight to keep some shots of them – ha ha! (First world problems, I guess).

What did you enjoy most about the job?

Coming up with the idea… and finishing it. All the shit in the middle is painful survival… but maybe I enjoy pain.