14 DAY TRIAL // Michael Jackson’s first posthumous single, released on the occasion of the documentary of the same name, “This Is It,” has now an official video to go with it. As MTV can also confirm, the video was directed by famed director Spike Lee and is a collage of images and photos of Michael throughout the years, in what turns out to be an incredibly heartwarming tribute for the late King of Pop.
“The emotional video intersperses iconic images of the late pop singer with footage shot in Jackson’s hometown of Gary, Indiana, and fan tributes following his death June 25. It opens with a tight shot of a poster in Gary pointing fans toward Jackson’s childhood home, at the corner of 2300 Jackson Street and Jackson Family Boulevard, under the sound of vintage recordings of the Jackson siblings calling for Michael. In an image he returns to several times in the nearly five-minute clip, Lee pans across a one-way traffic sign near the legendary Jackson bungalow that is covered in graffiti honoring the late pop icon, including ‘we luv yuh Michael,’ written in a childlike scrawl,” MTV says of the video.
Images of the singer interacting with his fans across the world and of him in concert are interspersed with photos of him and the pets that have become iconic in their own turn for the connection they had with the singer. Among these, Lee inserts images and videos of fans paying their respects to the one they will always call the King, from lookalikes and fans who can barely stand, to messages left on walls and the most unlikely places. Overall, the video delivers the message, loud and clear: this may be “it,” but Michael Jackson will live forever in the heart of his fans.
“At one point, one of the lyrics from the song, ‘I never heard a single word about you,’ floats up out of the concrete, fading to more shots of fan tributes from around the world and the heaps of flowers and messages laid at the gates of the singer’s Neverland Ranch. Lee returns several times to moving images of a single red balloon floating in the air and empty swings swaying in the breeze. Fittingly, the video ends with classic footage of Jackson doing the moonwalk and a dramatic pan to a black stool with Jackson’s trademark black Fedora and silver glove under a spotlight in front of the Gary residence,” MTV says.
Below is the full video for Michael Jackson’s “This Is It.” Enjoy.