Videos Inspired by Alejandro Jodorowsky’s The Holy Mountain: Bright Colors and Hipster Ponces

Anyone who has seen the 1970 film El Topo, directed by Chilean filmmaker, mime, and Tarot enthusiast Alejandro Jodorowsky, will probably agree that it is a visually glorious piece. If you have never seen it, or even heard of it, John Lennon being an out and out fan boy for the flick might serve as decent enough encouragement to seek it out. Lennon and Yoko Ono aided in the statewide release and distribution of El Topo, which is about a gunfighter who, after defeating the top master in a series of duels, goes sort of insane and reemerges as a Buddhist, adept at miming and worshipped by a village’s shunned and deformed population.

Lennon and Ono financed Jodorowsky’s next film, 1973’s The Holy Mountain. Brimming with religious symbolism, tarot allusions, and images artfully shot in captivating technicolor, the movie---which was not treated to a wide release until 2007--has seen various tributes in the realm of music videos.

Because I failed at putting much thought into this post, only the obvious videos will be hyperlinked and reviewed in this post. I would hyperlink the corresponding Holy Mountain clips as well, but most are not available on Youtube. These serve as a good taster, though.

Marilyn Manson--“The Dope Show”
As far as kind of recent musicians go, it is no secret that Jodorowsky is way into Marilyn Manson, even admitting in the book The Spiritual Journey of Alejandro Jodorowsky that he “sensed genius” upon catching Manson being gothically laissez faire in a television interview. The fandom is mutual; shortly thereafter, Manson sent Jodorowsky a letter, pointing out that a scene in his video, “The Dope Show,” was a homage to a Holy Mountain scene in which a thief awakes in a room and with great consternation discovers that he has unwittingly been used as a model for replicas of Christ. In the “Dope Show” video, Manson awakes to find replicas of himself, which he proceeds to destroy. Given the song’s subject of idolizing the famous, Manson’s unfavorable reaction to the models is understandable. The video packs a nice industrial glam punch, and the gay cops may or may not be a nod to the gay sheriffs who make an appearance during El Topo’s second half.

MGMT --“Time to Pretend”
Amid all the hipster hypnotizing kaleidoscopic sfx and shots of MGMT, who are so obnoxiously attractive that I’ve fancied wringing their necks more than a few times, are two Holy Mountain-inspired scenes, one featuring MGMT and pals sitting at a table and pushing cash into a fire at the table’s center, and another showing the same cast atop a temple. This video is way too intentionally makeshift and busy, but it does contain one cool image that is lacking from The Holy Mountain, and that is a giant, rideable kitten.

Late of the Pier--“Heartbeat”
This is like a Klaxons video, minus the seizure lights and Klaxons in the nude, an image which makes the viewer yearn to take a melon scoop to their eyeballs. This video mostly nicks The Holy Mountain’s set design, but I can’t really tell why, other than the fact that this band seems like a bunch of art kids trying to be cool. The Holy Mountain didn’t need no stinking skinny indie kids collapsing into its sets. This is not an improvement upon the source material nor a fitting homage, sorry!

Santigold --“L.E.S. Artistes”
So, this is homage done right. The video is a direct replication of what is possibly The Holy Mountain’s best-known scene--one that reveals the artifice of special effects. The visuals appear relevant to the subject matter of the song, yet the video somehow remains mysterious enough that a viewer may want to find out what else is behind its look. I’m not quite sure what the opening scene of Santigold on horseback in a woods is all about, but otherwise, very good job, and Santigold can rightly be called both cool and fierce.


Questionable Homage:

Beck--“Sexx Laws”
A couple of Beck’s songs reference the film, plus it seems like the sort of movie weird and arty pre-Scientologist Beck would love, so incorporating its style into his music videos seems like a given. This one contains a scene that involves a lot of paint being splattered in a similar way to the Santigold video/Holy Mountain special effects scene, and a character who looks slightly similar to the alchemist played by Jodorowsky himself in the film, but these may just be coincidences. Even if the Jodorowskyesque vibe was unintentional, this video is still pretty excellent, in spite or maybe because of the cameo by Jack Black, not to mention the humping cans of Spam.


El Topo Honorable Mention:

Manic Street Preachers--“Found That Soul”
I hate to be one of those people who pauses a video and then records the exact time something appears on screen, but at 1:14, a paperback copy of the El Topo screenplay shows up. This video is basically cool books and nocturnal animals filmed in night vision, but seeing as El Topo’s screenplay is one of the cool books in question, there is little to complain about here. I have a long, emotionally painful history of being a Manics fan, but hey, I’m not complaining about that either. They are still “That Band” for me, but I can also admit they are goddamn pretty ridiculous. The only goddamn ridiculous thing about this song, however, is that it is grossly underrated. As soon as I pressed the play button, the opening riff proceeded to rock off my face, starting from the hairline down. Also, their new album, Journal for Plague Lovers, is brilliant and I will probably be raving about it in this space eventually.


In conclusion, paying respects to Alejandro Jodorowsky leads to mixed results, but as long as people like Santigold do it correctly enough that a few curious fans are compelled to view the source material, I can cope with cheesy effects and indie-rocker prats.