“Is Tropical’s The Greeks” is a music clip Directed by a French team named Megaforce and the animated by a small studio called Seven. Megaforce has an impressive body of work, they have worked with a range of artist from kid cudi, tame impala and two door cinema club.
“Is Tropical’s The Greeks” is essentially about a group of young boys playing pretend shooting games around the house using nerf guns, fake drugs and even pretend C4 (I wish nerf guns were invented when I was a kid).
The clip is basically a tribute to childhood pastime; Megaforce thought to take it to the next level and add cartoony animated explosives and blood to substitute for the child’s vivid imagination. Is Tropical said: "It isn't a shocking rebuke to our drama queen, populist news culture either - just naive, blissful shoot-your-mate until he's definitely dead war-games -the way you wish it still could be”.
The style of the animation I think had great influence by manga, composition wise the animation somehow blends with the scene quite effortlessly. Megaforce filmed this clip over a period of two days in the suburban streets of France.
I am unsure on the process of how “seven” created the animations. I have always enjoyed 2d animation and in many cases prefer it over 3d animation, the thought of how much work goes into drawing and redrawing frames is mind boggling.
It really is an eccentric concept, and the team accomplished a visually appealing composite which is aesthetically relevant to the band. Although the video is somewhat violent and may offend many it still resonates with an individual that has a sense of humour. I personally found it funny but can also understand how one could be offended by the extreme use of mindless animated violence towards children. With movies becoming increasingly violent we see kids trying to mimic their role models on the Hollywood front, Megaforce simply replaced their imagination with animation.
Overall this clip is fantastic and very original in terms of music video subject matter. I think Megaforce and Seven have done a great job of directing and animating.