Valentines Video Goodness

This Valentine’s Day, along with a mixed bag of lovesick and lovelorn friends and acquaintances who all think Chaucer was a hack, I’m catching the sequel to one of the best flicks of 2006, Step Up 2: The Streets. It ranks medium on the Metacritic scale, low on the romantic scale, but is through the roof on the hip-hop-dancing-movies-are-totally-effin-awesome scale.

I’m forgoing the flowers, cards, <3-related paraphernalia, and eco-friendly, sexy gifts of the real world, but I’m consuming my fair share of Valentine-inspired ephemera online. Here are the videos I’ve been most attracted to:

Corky Quakenbush – Cupid Busted!

 

###Brad Neely – A Valentine from Eva

Even before Mel Brooks penned Springtime for Hitler, American-produced WWII propaganda ensured that making fun of the Fuhrer would always be in fashion. From Benigni to mad libs of The Downfall I don’t think anyone’s done it better than creased comic Brad Neely. His love letter to Adolf from Eva embodies the caustic, furious, insane, unpoetic infatuation I’d expect from German poetry during the Third Reich.

Black 20 – Cupid’s Bloody Valentine

Like Quakenbush, Black20 founders J. Crowley and Neil Punsalan have gained internet notoriety by depicting characters that don’t exist. Created when they were employees at NBC, The Easter Bunny Hates You caused such a stir that it prompted the duo to jump corporate ship and try this web video thing out on their own. In this oldie but goodie, Cupid embodies a violent interpretation of the adolescent babe slinging arrows dipped in romance, though he still wears a diaper.

 

Ben Schwartz – Valentine’s Break-Up

Ben Schwartz is funny when he’s telling jokes that suck. When he’s acting out a sketch that has actually gained the approval of his producers, he’s hysterical. Here, his comedic and romantic timing are inversely proportional.

Happy V-Day to you and yours!

Corky Quakenbush’s stop-motion claymation is possibly more funny, ridiculous, and absurd that Corky Quakenbush’s name. His moldings have taken the shape of fictional characters including Leprechauns and Santa Claus and appeared on television programs like Mad TV. Here, Officers Nick Wallace and Peter Gromit (a less than subtle nod to the masters of the genre) take out a male, Caucasian suspect, 10-12 months old with wings, and wearing a diaper.