Michael Jackson’s This Is It

reviewed by Deborah Garcia

You’ve been hit by, you’ve been struck by a smooth criminal … and so, I was. My initial curiosity to see the last footage of Michael Jackson’s final concert rehearsals became utter fascination and inspiration within seconds after the film began.

Throughout my life, I hadn’t ever gotten overwhelmed with fandom for Michael’s music, even if it played in the backdrop to many of my formative years. This Is It has changed that and offers the same potential to others like me who never thought they’d fall under Michael’s spell.

Never-ending streams and pulses of dance energy shoot, pop and break out from Michael Jackson’s lithe frame with every breakbeat and syncopated rhythm. For a neophyte like me, it would have been easy to think he couldn’t contain his energy or, rather, what was so integral to his artistic depth: his chi and vital source of creativity. The truth is he contained and channeled his artistic creativity in measured and tempered song filled with long-drawn breaths, shouts, polished musicality and the art of motion.

This Is It provides such a complex view of Michael and all his talents: the film has a multidimensional focus, much like a faceted cube. There's a 3-D effect this documentary achieves and captures as MJ works, performs, directs and perfects what was so uniquely his—his own art form represented in the marriage of dance, song and feeling.

The viewer should pay a keen eye to his dance ticks and highly-tuned ear. Michael Bearden, credited as Michael’s music director, states, “Michael knows all the tempos, key signatures, key changes of each of his songs.” Michael could hear when the pitch and rhythm were off, too fast, and notes were thudded or being ham-fisted.

Directed by Kenny Ortega, Michael was given regal control while rehearsals went on. It didn’t end there. Michael’s own music seemed to never fail in inspiring him or translating into the infectious calls and responses his dancers carried through in moves and shouts while offstage. In every measured beat and note landed, one can hear a delicacy achieved and seamlessly delivered.

Ortega nurtured tremendous verve among the tour cast, resulting in sets where Michael powered through rehearsals with unstoppable skip and free-form dancing. Astoundingly, Michael mostly held his singing back during each rehearsal—a feat attributable to years spent mastering his music and from raw, unending depth of feeling. Michael said, “It’s all for love.” I finally believed him.

A studious understanding of his anthology of hits and his eras of cumulative success is lacking in my review. However, This Is It takes on a reprise to the indicting and unforgettable Martin Beshear interviews. With each hit performed in the film, it’s palpable how personal Michael intended to be with his fans. Each song is sung for you. So, when he opens with the softly-landed lyrics, “You and I must make a pact,” that artistic pact is most definitely alive with fans in every dance burst, extended vocals, and political message.

Michael certainly was on a different plane of creativity. The heightened sense he had for every performance detail amazes. He had an ear for the sounds, pitch, subtleties and nuances his music could take on--jazz rhythms, pop and rock beats. He heard notes others couldn’t and easily projected his vision for choreographed moves and precise musicality. In fact, Michael demanded the film’s musicians let the music breathe and come to a full rise without rushing—he wanted his fans to be “nourished” by it.

This Is It, the tour, would have delivered a highly designed narrative with pyrotechnics, growling and sizzling sound effects, and such a personalized message of Michael’s aesthetic that one can’t help thinking they were on the forefront of witnessing a new multigenre of concert, musical, acrobatics and video-making come to life. God bless Kenny Ortega and his talent for knowing how to capture and portray Michael’s musical legacy. This Is It kicked off and caught me up on long overdue respect for the King of Pop.

Deborah Garcia is a publishing and writing professional born and raised in San Antonio, Texas. Continuing to straddle cultural fronteras, she moved back to her hometown in 2008 after having spent half of her life on the East Coast.

¡Feliz Año!

Happy New Year! These are my favorites songs to say goodbye to 2008. These songs are played tonight all over Latin America and in all Spanish radio stations in the USA. If you don’t have access to any radio en español, you can have your own La Bloga end of the year party. Hook up your speakers to your computer and begin to dance.

Here is my count down for un feliz año nuevo!

5- El viejo

An old tradition in Latin America is to burn the ‘old year’. Some people construct an old man dressed up with very old clothes and full of gunpowder. They hang up the old man in the streets and when New Year has come, they burn it. Other option is to create an old man piñata. This song is about this tradition.




4- Año nuevo, vida nueva

Yes, for the New Year there has to be a new life. A new year with new resolutions, what are your resolutions for 2009?



3- Vamos a brindar por el ausente

Great song if you are far away from your loved ones. For all the immigrants who are far away from their countries and families, this song is very special.



2- Cinco pa’ las doce

This song is played at 11:55. When it is five minutes to twelve, you will hear this song in all the corners of the Americas.




1- El año viejo

There is not an end of the year fiesta with out “El año viejo”. This song is a must at midnight. There are many versions, but this is the original.

Feliz año 2009

Feliz Navidad y Gud Yontif!

Raymation: An Interview with Artist/Director Ray Prado

You just don’t find men like Ray Prado in Vermont. I mean, motion picture director, storyboard artist, animator, music video producer, college football player, wine connoisseur and retailer, and that’s just for starters. Did I mention guapo? Well he is. Actually, you don’t find men like Ray Prado anywhere, so how did he come to co-own a small patisserie in Vermont you ask? Well, I’ll tell you.

Ray grew up in Denver Colorado, of Chicano/Native-American/Japanese heritage. He attended Dartmouth College and majored in visual studies, art history and anthropology. In his early 20s he made his way west again, and “lied” himself onto a game show and won enough money to last until he got his first job drawing storyboards (seriously, I couldn’t make this stuff up).

He was then hired by Marvel Productions to storyboard/direct a rap-oriented cartoon called "Kid N Play" based on the rap duo of the same name. “I think I was hired because I was young and cheap and understood the music.” He eventually went on to draw storyboards for major Hollywood motion pictures including Devil's Advocate and X-Men which, he says, nearly sent him into an early retirement. He is also a second unit director and has worked on such disparate movies as Dodgeball and Ray, for which director Taylor Hackford was nominated for best director by the DGA and by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

But he and his wife Gesine eventually tired of the Hollywood lifestyle and they moved back east ostensibly for her to go to culinary school, but with the unexpected success of her macaroons they opened up a—as he refers to it--not-so-profit bakery called Gesine Confectionary in Montpelier, Vermont.

All this is dazzling enough (can you say hombre de Renaissance?) but what really impresses me about Ray is his versatility. This week he launched a music video that he directed and animated that is one of the most sophisticated and haunting pieces of animation I’ve ever seen. I spoke to Ray between lattes this afternoon:

Congratulations on your music video for Wasted. What a spectacular and complex piece of animation. How long did it take to complete?

Thank you. Well, I started it about a year ago in August of 2007. I had to stop altogether in December when I had to direct 2nd unit on Love Ranch in New Mexico and couldn't get back to it until after another movie I did in the spring in Boston called The Proposal. In all, I probably completed it in about six months elapsed time.

How did you get involved in the project?

I am a big fan of Matthew Bryan. We met here in Vermont and I thought, WOW, this guy is a unique raw talent that people need to know about. When he decided to move to Austin and pursue his career there, I offered to make him a video so he would have a kind of "calling card". As a painter, I would hire Matthew as a model and thought it would be great to combine the two mediums.

Is the process similar to what you do as a storyboard artist?

Similar in the way that in order to get it done I have to draw like a madman without even thinking about going back and making adjustments and changes to what I had already drawn. Very different in that it was much more of a creative endeavor with no restraints and I approached it as if I were just animating my doodles and free-form sketches that would reflect whatever was in my mind when I sat down that day to draw. The only constant was sticking to the mood of what I felt when I first heard his song and keeping Matthew well-rendered so that we could actually see him singing. He is amazing to watch.

When did you start drawing?

I always liked to draw, but somehow I was convinced that it wasn't a legit profession for an ivy leaguer to do for a living. I was a little ashamed of my talent, actually. I felt a bit like a living stereotype, in a way. The Latino artist making his way out of the barrio with a paint brush. Only there was no barrio. I was a football player and I couldn't speak Spanish.

I wised up eventually. Embraced my talents and have lived an incredible life.

There is so much in the video that is stylized like a graphic novel, are you influenced by that art form?

Of course I am. As I was drawing one day, I decided to turn Matt into one of my favorite comic book characters that Neal Adams used to draw for DC called Deadman. I also turned him, for a few seconds, into one of the Baseball Furies from the Walter Hill movie, The Warriors. I gotta say that the seminal 80's A-Ha video, Take on Me has been one of my biggest influences for drawing for film.

Do you see yourself working on more music videos?

I've directed other music videos, but they bore me if my only duty is to point a camera at a band lip-synching to one of their songs. I am lucky enough to do a video if I want to, or work on a movie here and there. So if the perfect scenario presents itself I'll do anything.

How is the Matthew Bryan going to use the video?

Hopefully he can use it to help get his name out there. Unfortunately, the days of MTV playing videos all day are over. Maybe he can reach a wide audience online. There are already thousands of people who have seen this video who otherwise wouldn't have heard of him. The video is posted on youtube and vimeo. He has it on his personal sites as well.

Tell us something that isn't on the official bio.

I want to make the Lawrence Welk biopic.