Honestly, if you grew up with a TV in the late 90s, you probably have some weirdly specific trauma thanks to Chris Cunningham music videos. You know the ones. The grainy night-vision, the distorted faces, the robots that looked a little too human. It wasn't just "edgy" content; it was a total rewiring of what a music video could actually be.
Before he was the guy making us jump out of our skins, Cunningham was a special effects nerd. He worked with the big guns—David Fincher on Alien 3, Stanley Kubrick on A.I. Artificial Intelligence. He spent years obsessing over prosthetics and robotics. When he finally pivoted to music videos, he didn't just bring that technical baggage with him. He blew it up.
The Aphex Twin Era: Faces You Can't Unsee
The partnership between Chris Cunningham and Richard D. James (Aphex Twin) is basically the gold standard for unsettling art. It started with "Come to Daddy" in 1997. If you haven't seen it, lucky you. It features a pack of small children running through a bleak London housing estate, all wearing the same grinning, adult face of Richard D. James.
The climax? A skeletal, screaming demon crawls out of a discarded television set and screams directly into the face of a terrified old woman. It’s loud. It’s jagged. It’s perfect.
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Then came "Windowlicker." This one is arguably his most famous work. It starts as a parody of high-budget hip-hop videos—long limos, bikinis, sunny vibes—and then takes a hard left turn into the uncanny valley. Again, every woman in the video has James’s bearded, smiling face digitally grafted onto her head. It’s funny for exactly three seconds before it becomes deeply, deeply wrong.
Breaking Down "All Is Full of Love"
In 1999, Cunningham teamed up with Björk, and the result was "All Is Full of Love." This was a massive shift. Instead of the grimy, urban decay of his Aphex Twin work, we got something clinical. Sterile. White.
It features two robots—modeled after Björk herself—being assembled in a factory. As the mechanical arms screw them together and pump them full of white fluid, the robots begin to sing and eventually kiss. It’s one of the few times "industrial robotics" and "tender romance" have ever occupied the same space.
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Interestingly, Cunningham was actually a bit of a perfectionist nightmare during this shoot. He reportedly hated how the physical set looked and spent a ridiculous amount of time in post-production with software like Softimage and Flame to make the robots feel fluid. Each shot had four layers. It was technically lightyears ahead of what anyone else was doing at the time.
The Technical Wizardry (And Why It Looks Better Than Modern CGI)
People always ask how his stuff still looks so good in 2026. Part of it is the mix of physical and digital. Cunningham didn't just "fix it in post." He built real models.
For "Windowlicker," he used Panavision cameras and shot on anamorphic film. He’d scan the film, do the crazy face-swapping in a digital environment, and then often print it back to film or high-end formats like Digibeta. By blending real-world lighting with digital manipulation, he avoided that "floaty" look that ruins a lot of modern CGI.
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Essential Chris Cunningham Videography
- Autechre - Second Bad Vilbel (1995): Pure machine aesthetics.
- Portishead - Only You (1997): Shot underwater to simulate a strange, slow-motion gravity.
- Madonna - Frozen (1998): Gothic, shape-shifting, and actually a huge mainstream hit.
- Squarepusher - Come On My Selector (1998): A manic, chaotic breakout from an asylum.
- The Horrors - Sheena Is a Parasite (2006): A return to his visceral, body-horror roots.
Rubber Johnny and the "Disappearance"
In 2005, he dropped Rubber Johnny. It’s a six-minute short film set to an Aphex Twin track that features a mutant child in a basement. It was shot on night-vision DV over the course of several years’ worth of weekends.
After that, the trail goes a bit cold. He did some work for Gucci and some live audiovisual shows, but he mostly stepped away from the traditional music video grind. There have been rumors for decades about a feature film, but nothing has quite materialized in the way fans hoped. He’s notoriously picky. He once said that when YouTube showed up, he felt a bit defeated because he’d spend three years on a short film only for someone to watch it in 240p on a tiny screen.
What You Should Do Next
If you’re a filmmaker, a musician, or just someone who likes weird stuff, there's still a lot to learn from Cunningham’s approach to Chris Cunningham music videos.
- Study the sync: Watch "Come On My Selector" and look at how every single beat is tied to a visual movement. It’s not just "cutting to the beat"; the characters' actions are the rhythm.
- Go physical first: If you're making your own visuals, try using real props or makeup before jumping into a 3D software. The "realness" of Cunningham’s work comes from the fact that a lot of it was actually there on set.
- Look for the "Off" factor: His work proves that you don't need a huge budget to be memorable. You just need a vision that’s slightly—or very—uncomfortable for the viewer.
You can find most of these videos remastered on various archival sites now. Seeing "All Is Full of Love" in high definition for the first time is a legitimate experience. It’s art that doesn't just sit there; it demands you deal with it.
Next Steps for Enthusiasts:
Start by watching the "Directors Label" DVD series if you can find a copy. It places Cunningham alongside other legends like Spike Jonze and Michel Gondry, providing a full context of why that specific era of music videos was so revolutionary. After that, look up his 2024 video installation "Transforma" to see how his style has evolved into the gallery space.