I’ve reviewed roughly 550 films. I recently reviewed a television series (if you consider Twin Peaks to be a television series, but that’s not the discussion right now). However, today I am breaking a few boundaries and writing a piece on something entirely unconventional, something entirely new ground for me: a music video. Not just any music video, but perhaps the most important music video of the twenty-first century – Childish Gambino’s This Is America which has grown from a humble supplement to Gambino’s newest song, to a bona fide cultural phenomenon in only a week. Of course, logically it is impossible to review a film in the same way we review a feature-length film (despite the fact that This Is America says more in four minutes than many films are able to in two hours), but rather, let us have a discussion about this audacious achievement that is nothing short of a monumental contribution to popular culture. This Is America has resulted in countless think-pieces across the internet and in written media, from detailed break-downs of the multitude of themes and images that contribute to a broader meaning, to overviews of the bold statements Gambino was making with both this song and the video. This is going to be uncharted territory, so bear with me as I look at a few notable aspects, and contribute to an endless stream of literature that has hit the internet and collective conscience over the past week, in a way not many music videos are able to. As a result, I will not be rating This Is America, because of two reasons: logically, it doesn’t make sense to assign a score to something like this, as well as the fact that Gambino was conveying something that transcends the visual form, so in essence, we are looking at the message rather than the package it was delivered in, but we also need to consider how the themes were so brilliantly conveyed. This Is America is an anomaly, and I highly doubt I will be reviewing many music videos after this, but there are just some moments that require thought and meditation, and This Is America is one of them.

First, let’s discuss the two people behind this video. The first is the artist himself, Childish Gambino. There have been few meteoric rises from obscurity to worldwide acclaim in my lifetime quite as remarkable as that of Donald Glover. From being rejected from being a castmember on Saturday Night Live, to writing for 30 Rock, to playing the lovable, scene-stealing Troy on Community, to a profoundly successful and insightful music career under the Childish Gambino moniker, not to mention evolving into an unconventional auteur with Atlanta, Glover has snuck his way into the hallowed halls of pop culture without much fanfare, growing steadily as an artist. One can compare his ascent to history-making acclaim to that of Jordan Peele, who transitioned from Comedy Central sketch comedy star to Academy Award-winning horror auteur with his masterpiece Get Out (which, unsurprisingly, uses Gambino’s magnum opus “Redbone” in the film’s most pivotal moments). Watching Glover grow as an artist has been a truly rewarding experience, and his sheer audacity has been nothing less than astonishing. This Is America represents a shockingly brilliant moment in his career, one that will doubtlessly make all of those who have not made note of the artist’s talent finally pay attention.

Before discussing the video itself, I just want to mention the other individual that is as responsible for the brilliance of This Is America as Gambino himself, the director Hiro Murai. Mark my words: Hiro Murai is the future of filmmaking, with this being a prediction I am entirely confident in being true. His career as a director has involved multiple music videos for some of contemporary music’s most influential and audacious artists, as well as directing some of the most stunning television episodes of the past few years, working on television shows such as Legion, Atlanta (hardly surprising, considering the subject of this discussion) and Barry. Very rarely does a director for television receive the acclaim that launches him to the position of an auteur, but it seems like Murai is set to change the cinematic landscape. He and Glover are close artistic collaborators, and they have arguably done their finest work together. I recently read a profile on Murai, where he notes his two biggest cinematic influences in the making of This Is America were Fernando Meirelles’ City of God and Darren Aronofsky’s mother!, which are hardly anything less than daring and fearless masterpieces. This Is America is just the start for Murai, who I truly believe is going to change cinema in his own way.

Having contextualized the background to this video by looking at the two audacious artists behind it, we can consider the result itself. What can we say about This Is America? If I knew the answer to this question, I wouldn’t be writing this review (if you can even call the passionate ramblings of a shaken admirer “a review”), nor would the countless think-pieces that have overtaken the internet in the past week even exist (and I highly suggest going in search of some of these pieces. The collective consciousness, whether it be journalists, scholars or ordinary people on social media, have come together as a result of This Is America and have made some profound discoveries and interpreted this music video with the most intricate and wonderful detail). This Is America is one of those rare pieces of art that astonishes in a way that leaves the audience both speechless and delusional with frenzied excitement. It is possible to dissect every moment of This Is America and write extensive thoughts about it, and there will still be details that I would leave out because encapsulating the entirety of this video is nearly impossible. That’s why, once again, it is imperative that one seeks out the myriad of literature written about this music video because it is certainly worth it. In order to achieve our aim here, however, we need to follow a specific, coherent path – so we’ll divide This Is America into two questions: what is Childish Gambino trying to say, and how does he say it? That should give us enough space to consider some of the major themes of the video, without attempting to solve the intricate and meticulous puzzle Gambino provided us with.

What was Gambino trying to say when he made This Is America? As many interpretations make clear, he was attempting to focus on a worrying trend of modern American society (although it can be extended to most societies around the world): the influence of social media and the internet in a consumer-driven, capitalist society. Gambino’s message is clear: we live in a world governed by viral videos, superficial online connections and attention spans so fragile and short, we are entirely distracted from the world around us. There are serious, dire situations occurring that the general population is not aware of, not because they are obscure or hidden (in fact, the exact opposite: they are in plain sight). The modern American society obscures the truth, and we don’t pay attention to serious issues, because it is far easier to focus on what brings joy. This Is America so boldly asserts that we are a society desensitized to reality, and Gambino forces us to watch a visual representation of the anarchy affecting the country, borne out of the mentality of “out of sight, out of mind” – but what if these problems are not out of sight, but rather we are distracted by what is more entertaining and endearing to our inherent human nature of following what is enjoyable rather than what is painful. Racism, xenophobia, sexism, classism, homophobia: these are important subjects in dire need of public attention, yet we are constantly drawn away from these serious matters through viral distraction. If that isn’t a strong message on behalf of Gambino, then I’m not sure what is.

How does Gambino realize this message in the video for This Is America? Working alongside Murai, Gambino creates an astonishing but simple visual representation for what he is trying to say through the song. The entire video takes place within what appears to be a warehouse. Gambino saunters around, alternating between quirky, eccentric dance moves and acts of brutal, unhinged violence, such as the lynching of a hostage and the mass murder of a choir, which (considering events from only a few years ago, that shockingly still persist to this day), strikes a particularly macabre chord. Meanwhile, while dancing and murdering, Gambino’s character distracts the viewer from what is going on in the background, where pandemonium swells around him – individuals commit suicide by throwing themselves from great heights, the police follow a white horse (the Biblical implications of this imagery is well-established, but no less impactful) and general anarchy occurs behind Gambino – yet, it takes repeated viewings to notice these details, because we are far too distracted by the hilariously sinister dance moves of Gambino, doing his best to draw our attention away from what matters the most. There is meaning packed into literally every frame of This Is America, and one could write entire theses on the minuscule details that linger in the background of this video. Kudos to Gambino and Murai, who create something truly genius, both cinematically (the cinematography is some of the greatest ever seen on a music video, with effortless camera work and complex compositions only elevating This Is America further than the boundary-breaking heights it has already achieved) and theoretically, the perfect visual representation of a society in rapid but silent decline.

One issue that I have yet to see being looked at is quite a simple one: in spite of everything going on in the background of the video, with multitudes of viewers scrambling to break down what each image means, analyzing the background and the motifs that can be extracted from it. However, I haven’t noticed anyone focusing on one of the more crucial questions of this video: who (or what) does Gambino’s character represent? Society is represented around him – dancing teenagers, brutal police officers, anonymous victims and even the tangible embodiment of death (and SZA, for some reason) – and I would argue that Gambino is the physical manifestation of social decline, as well as the experience of being an African-American in an era that is supposed to be progressive and inclusive, but is starting to appear to be anything but (one just needs to look at the multiple racial motifs present throughout, such as references to Jim Crow, lynching and other racially-charged themes). He is social media condensed into a human form, a distracting and volatile entity that provides endless entertainment as well as being the harbinger of anarchy. Despite clearly being shown as a malicious, sinister and bloodthirsty entity, we cannot take our eyes of the character, which only satisfies our morbid fascination, evoking the same feeling of forbidden curiosity we all feel when hearing about a particularly violent accident, or the obsession the public has with true crime stories. Most of us would never consider becoming a serial killer, or a mass shooter: yet, we are enamored with the stories of their actions. It is a human response to be curious and inquisitive about these things – and this is precisely why we cannot take our eyes off Gambino. It is not his dancing that distracts us. It is not his positioning in the foreground of the video most of the time that draws our eyes towards him. It is the fact that he satiates the desire to look. Gambino created a fully-realized character in only four minutes, a complex figure that the audience cannot look away from, which is in itself a monumental achievement. I am not sure if my interpretation is even vaguely accurate, but there is a certain nuance in this character, a sinister streak, that suggests at something much deeper. Who’s to say what he represents, other than something very worrying about our society?

Arguably, I spent a lot of this review looking at aspects of This Is America that are not entirely relevant to the work itself – looking at the social impact the video has amassed in less than a week, alongside the various interpretations that go along with it. However, can it be considered inappropriate, though? A large portion of what has made This Is America such a cultural phenomenon is the circumstances that surround it. Whether or not someone is a devotee of the type of music that Gambino makes, the themes of This Is America extends far beyond the song itself (which is still a tremendous song in isolation, and the live version he performed on Saturday Night Live proves this). This Is America is about much more than the song – it is about society, and what Gambino and Murai have done here is beyond astonishing. They hold up a mirror to society in a way that does not shy away from the truth, and it is uncomfortable and incredible in equal measure. This Is America represents a new stage in Glover’s career, but certainly will be nothing close to the peak – he will continue to only steadily grow from this moment onwards, and I have a feeling we have not seen the full capacity of what he is capable of. I expect the following few years will see Glover/Gambino pushing the limits of visual storytelling and music even further. To be honest, if he continues making bold statements such as This Is America (but obviously not the same, because Gambino is anything but stagnant when it comes to his art), he will continue to steadily ascend to a celestially profound place of artistic expression. Not to mention Murai, who is already establishing himself as a director worth keeping an eye on.

In conclusion, this review was unchartered territory. I have yet to review a music video, and while this may be the only one for a while (or perhaps forever), very rarely does something like this move to the point where I need to explore it further? This Is America is on its way to being a contemporary cultural cornerstone, and I would be surprised if it isn’t the subject of further debate and discussion for years to come. It is a brilliant, subversive and surreal masterwork, and something truly extraordinary. It transcends its format and becomes something far more profound. I have watched it dozens of times now, and I find something new every time, and each viewing still leaves me absolutely astounded at the sheer audacity and fearless brilliance that went into making this incredible work. In only four minutes, Childish Gambino said more about society than even the most distinguished of academics and theorists could, and that certainly means something. However, I’m not sure what exactly, and perhaps the rhetoric forming around this video will shed some light on some of the details that have yet to be explored. Brutal, funny and shocking, This Is America is truly unique and unforgettable.