"La Isla Bonita": ¿Te gusta mi vagina, senor?

Comin' at you full throttle and in horny Technicolor... my Catholic upbringing! Time to confess my unutterable sin: I've been avoiding Madonna's '80s trash trove.

I mean no offense, merry Maglodytes. It's just that... well, how shall we put it? Ah yes! These videos make fun of themselves. If Fucky Star's not knocking paws with a Venetian lion-man in a Goodwill wedding dress, then she's enraging Danny Aiello with her unladylike pregnancy. Come now, ladies, that's last week's episode of I Love Money. To keep things interesting, we'll analyze a video that offers equal sections of fun and epic discomfort. Please welcome to the program our long-admired, heavily herpe'd international trollop, "La Isla Bonita."

The fifth single off Madouchebag's 1986 blockbuster True Blue, "La Isla Bonita" is an homage to Latin America, where "the sun sets so high," "all of nature [is] wild and free," and also where Madonna and Sean Penn hide out after he bloodies the uppity paparazzi. Naturally, the video takes place in a blissful city saturated with grinning street musicians, dancing schoolchildren, and I guess no parents. Wuh-oh. Careful bouncing that elementary booty around the overzealous conga player, little Conchita. And don't buy his "chicle." Except the sad thing is you know they're MySpace friends.

The video opens with well-mimed guitar plucking by... my least favorite Los Lonely Boy? Did I even know I had a least favorite? Serious introspection occurring on this side of the blog, y'all. Stand clear.
How far is heaven, indeed. Hopefully not much farther than the unemployment office, from the looks of it.

Upstairs in a pretty-spacious-all-things-considered apartment, a conservatively attired Madonna peers out a window into her barrio below. Already we suspend our disbelief in record numbers. Still, the neighborhood's friendly, and Madonna evinces some credible, if melodramatic longing. The tear under her eye is a bit much, Director Mary Lambert.


After not spotting the amount of olive skin she hoped for in the 'hood, Madonna gives up on selecting a father for her first daughter. However, she does retreat to an altar, where she kneels, prays silently, and clutches a rosary. Ohhhh, the obvious career foreshadowing. Two years later, Madonna conjured some seriously perverse holiness, complete with crucifixes and rosaries, with the Pepsi-prickling "Like a Prayer." To be fair, though, from 1987 until 1989, she settled for dire unholiness.

Fear is the correct response, Griffin Dunne.

The video shifts to the street for more shots of our entranced Los Lonely Boy's pain-strumming. He's stirring up quite a crowd down there. Senseless Trivia Note: One of those boiz is Benicio Del Toro. Another one looks just like the late bassist Jaco Pastorius. Maybe Madonna threw in Debi Mazar somewhere too, who knows. And honestly, that Los Lonely Boy could be Sandra Bernhard. But before you start playing Where's Waldo with the prancing demi-celebrities, Madonna undergoes her newest reinvention right before your eyes!


Ow, ow! The rest of us foolishly pigeonholed the ladybug-flamenco get-up for the homos in Paris is Burning, but that's what's refreshing about Madonna. She reassures you that she's the gayest dude here. Seeeeriously though, my God, Lady M is GORGEOUS. Brunette always worked better on her, unless David Fincher or Herb Ritts helmed the lighting cues.

From here on out, Madonna transforms back and forth from pallid piety to harlot Miss Scarlet. The video weighs the conflicting, but ultimately interlocked worlds of religion and passion. And what interlocks them, you ask? Oh, Jenny, it's THE MUSIC, dammit! Of course! Yes, yes. I almost forgot to tell you: "La Isla Bonita" is a prequel to High School Musical 2.

Ultimately, flamenco Madonna heeds the encouragement of the swaying men on the street and sashays downstairs to entertain their daffy erections. She spins and flirts, even approaching Los Lonely and whsipering to him, "Te dijo te amo," which means, "He told you, 'I love you.'" Why Madonna is speaking in gay cryptograms to the hetero daddy, I will never know. But whatever, because Madonna ends the video by ditching them all and skipping down the block to her own beat and newfound joie de vive. Everyone thinks she's weird for that. Where are you going, Madonna? I'd love to hear a passerby guess your profession when you approach the street corner.

"La Isla Bonita" remains one of the most universally listenable Madonna tracks from the '80s. While Madonna produced flashier, more popular singles, "La Isla Bonita" feels so timeless, a genuine dance ballad with soul and spunk. The video's downright unassuming, but I think we can embrace carnal slow-play from "All the Way" Mae every so often. I wish the religious half of the video yielded more thoughtful results than a few lit candles (as well as an apartment that didn't feel like, hrm, a suicide), but I just-about love this video.

By the way, I guess "La Isla Bonita" is secretly about gypsies and shit too:

"Don't Tell Me": No Country for Old Menopause

Curse me for reviewing two videos in a row from the same album, but come on: How could I pass up revisiting Madonna's most credible, authentic persona yet? Face the facts, Jethro, when you think of Madonna, you never (ever) recall whorish gondola antics, or cross-burning, or material girliness, or the saliva Olympics with Britney Spears. Perish those limiting labels. Don't put this artiste in a box. We're talking about a Billboard Music Award winner here, you chauvinist.

Now sit back. Close your eyes. Demand honesty from yourself. Breathe. Think. Let the Light guide you. When you allow yourself to accept Madonna without the burden of the media's malignant snipes and liberal agenda, you begin to understand the craftswoman, the performance artist, the soul at work here. Two specific, powerful words spring to mind when you think of Madonna's true essence...

Folk hero.

Many casual fans forget that Madonna was born in the whispering prairies of Crumbling Fence, Nebraska, the daughter of a devoted ranch-hand and steadfast Sunday school instructor. She lamented the plight of the downtrodden farmer, vowing never to forsake her beloved terra firma. She clasped her first banjo down south at the crossroads, where the local black boys hollered call-and-response standards about the delta, the bottle, and the hurt. From there she set out for life along the rutted road, just she and her most trustworthy companion -- her six-stringed darling, Baby Annette. Or just Baby 'Nette, when you consider Lil Nonnie's harsh Dust Bowl twang.

Obviously the path from lonesome guitar vagabond to the Madonna we know in 2008 becomes refreshingly clear. Since she is A PAMPERED, BRAT-ASS MIDDLE CHILD WHO OBTAINED A TRILLION DOLLARS AND WOULD FUCKING POOP ON A FOLK ARTIST IF HE EVER DARED TO GLANCE HIS SHIT-STAINY EYES AT HER.

Let's start harmonizing several shouts of "WTF" for this effing video. We all know Madonna cops different personas for cheeky, half-provocative reasons. But country troubadour? It's just such blatant artifice, totally divorced from meaning and only justified by "Don't Tell Me"s somewhat folksy lyrics. The get-up feels as bizarre as the patent-leather Geisha from "Nothing Really Matters," but God, can we just not talk about that right now?

"Don't Tell Me" is the second video off Madonna's 2000 album Music, and according to Rock on the Net, it's her second biggest radio success ever. That's kind of redemptive, since "Don't Tell Me" ranks as a pretty tasteful, even emotional song from Magina's catalog. I can get behind its popularity. The video? Well, the video's a chore to swallow in some parts, but I do detect a modicum of wit behind the rodeo. Mind you, I also detect some funky manure in the form of Loretta Lynn's performance here. But ahh, one step at a time, pilgrim.

The video commences with Madonna strolling nonchalantly, if super-seriously, on what appears to be a marathon western road where Javier Bardem will own you. The camera pans back, revealing that Madonna is actually just walking on a treadmill in front of a staged, "long-country-road" backdrop. This theatrical unmasking alerts us that Madonna's in on the joke of her Bob Dylan shtick, but that doesn't stop her from mugging hard like a saloon owner's tobacky-hackin' battle axe. She means it, y'all. We're witnessing a conscientious songwriter here, so strap on yer grandpappy's bandanna and yank back the tears.

But while Madonna goes on hammering in the morning, or whatever, the rest of us need to rewind and observe the wardrobe (non-)choices:

Charlotte Russe? I didn't know you were invited.

I don't hate any part of the outfit (not even the dirt-dazzled jeans, courtesy of a top-tier douchebag at Guess), but just... blah. Mall clothes. Nothing memorable to write about here. In fact, enough already, onto the HAWT MEN.

I guess cowboys really enjoy throwing dirt, bounding into handstands, and two-stepping around their buddies, because I tell you these johns are positively ebullient. They also might be named Jack and Ennis, if you catch my definitely necessary drift. They clearly wish they knew how to quit you, Madonna. But they also wish they knew how to quit the adult film industry, Ecstasy, and checking themselves out in public, so maybe they're just impetuous people and you shouldn't really be flattered.

I'll hand Madonna her dues, though, because she pivots, swirls, and passionately rains dirt on herself with swell bravado. The melodrama of the kneeling-and-masturbating almost teeters into a full-fledged queef, but luckily we are saved by THIS:

YEE HAW! There's father's little psychiatry bill! You tease those boys with your coon pelt, Bonnie!

The outfit is hilarious or downright strumpety, depending on how fucking tired you are. The blue denim crotch is, quoth Aunt Michael Kors, "insane." I would've toned the attire down by roughly seven pegs. Fortunately, and I don't know if you all can see this from your computer, but THOSE MEN ARE SO HOT I'M CRYING. Please, more thrusting upward towards the hip-popping granny, lads! The choreography here, by the way, actually appears very rigorous, cool, and appropriately themed without venturing into gimmicks. It's just too bad our protagonist busies herself with dubious extracurriculars like shoving her boobs up to Venus, playing "Peekaboo Midriff" with the locals, and doing Dallas.

And it all culminates in some enlightened, Brahman level of flagrant poon imagery with Madonna conquering a mechanical bull and eventually strangling it with her Kagel muscles. I really applaud the juxtaposition of this majestic, almost maudlin instrumental with the bronco and billboard soundstages. Instead of becoming too precious and actually showing Madonna saddling up a real Appaloosa, we're treated to these clever, apparent facades. And yet the contemplative, cerebral vibe sticks. In a way this exemplifies Madonna: The culling of unexpected images and raiments for the viewer's surface enjoyment that are imbued with urgency, vitality, and wit. That triumvirate remains her signature.

Plus humping. She really gets a kick out of humping.

"What It Feels Like for a Girl": Kuntz come alive! But then they die, of course.

I admit bregrudgingly that part of this blog's purpose is to highlight the underrated works in Madonna's ouevre. Why "begrudgingly," you ask? One, it's a fun word. Two, I do such a good job trashing this woman. It's almost a letdown to acknowledge that I, er, devote much of my unsteady income to Madonna for a reason. Face it, you're disappointed.

Let's reestablish some givens right now: While I jest about Madonna's vascillating taste level and borderline-retardation, she's also -- in my humble, fascinating, correct opinion -- one of the few artists interesting enough to deserve lengthy scrutiny. She stands as the first artist to hone superstardom as its own artform. She's easily the best music video artist of all time. She's probably the fourth best gay man of all time. That said, many critics define Madonna's legacy only by her exploration of sexual politics, and that... sort of sucks. Especially when she made excellent music videos like "What It Feels Like for a Girl" that intentionally eschew overt sexuality.

In 2001, Madonna had a marriage with film director Guy Ritchie to defend, so she quickly embarrassed everyone and decided to collaborate with Ritchie on a movie. Their labor of love, a staggering shit-fortress called Swept Away, earned almost enough money to pay off Lourdes' eyebrow sculptor for a week. I said almost. Queerly enough, before Swept Away prompted Madonna to give up acting forever (fingers crossed), she and Guy collaborated successfully on her 2001 music video "What It Feels Like for a Girl," which was banned after only airing once on MTV.

Life's greatest journalist, Kurt Loder, broke the news during a 2 a.m. MTV news update that "WIFLFAG" wouldn't play in regular rotation. Those of us lucky to catch that announcement viewed the video the next night, and unless you were my professionally prude mother, you pretty much dug it.

This time, Madonna "plays" a stoic, guiltless woman decked in smoking-gun tattoos and tight, trenchy clothes. It's a hardcore redux of the pinstriped pantsuit from "Express Yourself," which garners applause from this fag.

Ever the environmentalist, Madonna mans the wheel of her Lamborghini (or something, don't fucking ask me) for a spin, and Guy Ritchie aims for subtlety by flashing the car's license plates, which say "PUSSY" on the front and "CAT" on the back. Do you see, world? She is a REBEL whore now. And that's two grades above the run-of-the-mill whore she usually is, 'kay?

In the car, Madonna remains expressionless and points her gloved hand out the window like a gun. Alright, we get it, Madge, you're pissed. We understand this video isn't the triple-perky sequel to "Cherish." I don't anticipate mermaids coming into the picture.

Our possessed heroine then stops by a nursing home, which is honestly called "Ol Kuntz Guest Home." Again, the theme today is subtlety. During Madonna's trip to "Ol Kuntz," she doesn't run into Leona Helmsley or Janice Dickinson, but she does find a kindly nonagenarian lady who occupies her time with jigsaw puzzles. But what to do with her? Steal her for a joyride in the Pussy-Cat roadster, obvi LOL!

Yeah, then the real "controversial" shit begins. As the daylight winds into night, Madonna and her elderly companion proceed to collide into a car full of alpha males at a stoplight, tase a bro at an ATM, steal wads of money, and befuddle a duo of police officers. No telling yet whether this video is just lifting episodes from the life story of Dana Plato.

It's important to realize that Madonna's character lashes out only at males. After mugging the man at the ATM, Madonna stuffs his money in the apron of a waitress at a drive-thru. You see, there is a little thing in life called oppression, and Madonna believes that women sometimes endure it. HARDY-HAR. If you liked that folk tale, Brer Rabbit's got a whole batch of others for you.

Anyway, after ramming her yellow speedster into a dreadfully unprepared cluster of street-hockey players, Madonna pulls up to a gas station and spots a cute red muscle-car with a thunderbird print on the hood, looking cuter than David Banda in a pit full of puppies. She must steal it. So she does! Gasoline spills everywhere, Zoolander is inspired, everything blows up behind her, and Madonna's off for the final act.

The last minute of the video flashes by in quick edits -- including frames of Madonna's fake IDs from multiple states, a tattoo on her neck that reads "LOVED," and speedy clips of bruises on both Madonna's body and the old lady's (Oh yeah, she's still in the car.) And then, as the hurtling trance music culminates, Madonna and her companion crash head on into a pole, and in slow motion we watch the car's red hood and windows shatter. A blazing suicide. Cute!

Also important: The last few seconds of the video provide a necessary parallel between Madonna and the old kunt. We see them strapping on bustiers, leg braces and other "confining" apparatus. The point being, both women find themselves bound; Madonna's the one lashing out, while the granny was letting it kill her. AND BETTY FRIEDAN CRIED.

What's special about this video's garish nature is that it gives way to a pretty well-executed message. None of this feels heavy-handed. And Madonna, for the first time in several centuries, gives a convincing performance. I mean, I wish the video didn't resemble that car commercial Ritchie directed (also starring Madonna), but, uh, this isn't bad stuff. You kind of don't stink right now, Madonna, and I don't know how I feel about it.

Oh-effing-wait. That bitch just dedicated her performance of "Like a Virgin" to the Pope. You see that sidebar at the top of the page? DID I NOT CALL THIS SHIT? P.S. You know Benedict XVI is more a Bedtime Stories homo, anyway.

"Fever": No, officer, there was seriously a fire in her pants.

We began with 1983, where an excited young tramp dazzled us with the flexibility of flannel on the dance floor. We cruised to 2008, where we suffered a concussion from a 50-year-old's overeager slingshot groin. And now we coast back to 1993, where Madonna finally revels in the simple things of patrician life. And I do mean banana hammocks and green-screen rave parties. Just like mom use'ta!

It is "Fever," bitches. "Fever" is a sweltering (ha), predictably libidinous track off the underrated Erotica album. As you probably know, it's a cover of the ancient Peggy Lee standard, except Madonna elected to erase the verses she didn't like. (All that "forsooth" and "Fahrenheit/Centigrade" shit hit the floor, along with Madonna's pants, which we'll so get to in a minute ohmigod.) This wouldn't be the last time Madonna gutted a pop classic, but whatever, Don MacLean, no one fucking knows why Jack Flash was sitting on candlesticks or bitching about fallout shelters for 9 minutes anyway.

Video legend Stephane Sednaoui directed this clip, and while his presence yields no cameo by four Alanis Morissettes caterwauling cross-eyed in an Oldsmobile, his fast, minimalist style is thumping all over "Fever." Let's talk about the complicated storyboard: Madonna is a pink-haired pussymonster gyrating in front of a convulsing green-screen. A shadowy naked dude artfully shrink-wraps his dong in lycra. Moaning from Our Mother The Whore commences. Then three trucks of body paint! More thrusting! Unnecessary costume pieces appear! Everything comes together! Madonna's boobs win!! "Rosebud" is his sled!!!

OK, while the video's short on plot, it's big on color and drama. That aforementioned green-screen morphs a few times, but mostly it remains a smoky red-and-pink hypermix lightshow. Even the casual fan knows we're inside Madonna's vagina.

Three things actually matter about this 3-star video:

1) The Silver Body-Paint, Courtesy of True Value's After-Halloween BLOWOUT: Stephane looooves the head-to-toe puffy paint, y'all. He directed the Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Give It Away" video, a stirring tribute to the lost craft of the circlejerk, and we all remember the silver-coated gymastics of that one. Madonna obviously saw that video's idea and quickly began doing what she does best, and that's stealing. Here she's decked in silver paint too, which turns her hair into unfriendly stalactites. Objectively I appreciate this depiction of primal sluttiness, but let's-fucking-face-it, this shit's dated. She looks like a Gatorade commercial. Or, like, Capri-Sun. Either way it's peasant swill, and Madonna's trying to be Evita in like ten minutes so just ew.

2) Only the best in Party City headgear: Man, 1993 is making its presence known here, almost winking at us with John Bobbitt's ailing dickhead. When Madonna dons the golden crown near the end of the video, do we not see a slight resemblance to Michael Jackson's 1993 "Remember the Time" clip? I mean, there's no hot-headed Eddie Murphy here, no state-of-the-art "quicksand morph" CG, and there's DEFINITELY no motherfucking-baller-Saint Iman here, butttt there is a golden crown and rigid posing. Mmmmkay, fine, bad analogy, it looks more like my high school's production of The King and I, which is nearly as horrifying, though not quite as littered with singalong racism.

3) Earth, Wind & Pants: Best idea Madonna ever had? Wearing green-screen goddamn PANTS. Check out the blazing billows on those stretch bad-boys; they look like special-edition pajama bottoms for the armageddon. They're positively smokin'! Teehee! And a dream to squat in!

All this talk of fevers and flaming pants really makes me wonder if this song is Madonna's coded message to Carlos Leon or Dennis Rodman that she contracted chlamydia. You just never know. Even though you do know that Madonna's vulva are apparently beaming with green-screen projectiles, steaming up the joint, and causing that naked lad's abs to perspire. Might be best to buy the latex now, Carlos. A latex motherfucking snowsuit.