After almost four months since her last video, Gaga releases a new video for "Telephone" featuring Beyonce, directed by Jonas Åkerlund.
This new nine minute video (dubbed by some as "Paparazzi" part 2) is distinctly Sapphic, with a lusty female prison and the "Thelma & Louise" relationship between the two protagonists. The movie - I mean video - has a very dark revenge plot, with Beyonce helping Gaga escape prison, plan the murder of her Beyonce's boyfriend, and ultimately, poison everyone in a small American diner and flee the scene in a swag "Pussy Wagon".
I commend the overall art direction, makeup and costuming. We see Gaga decked in oversized chains, wearing glasses made of lit cigarettes, Gaga bound and tangled tightly in crime scene tape, Gaga in a boat-sized sun hat - two thumbs up!
And while I was originally turned off by all of the overt product placement (Virgin Mobile, Diet Coke, PlentyOfFish.com, Beats by Dr. Dre, Polaroid, Miracle Whip, Wonderbread... the list goes on), this video is another shining example of Gaga's brilliance as an artist and businesswoman. The fact that she can simultaneously promote Wonderbread while conducting a mass homicide with her lesbian lover - she really is getting away with murder.
Watch it here.
