Lady Gaga’s new video is a fever-dream that turns into an IRL nightmare

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September 18, 2020 3:37 p.m. EST
September 18, 2020 3:53 p.m. EST
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The third single from Lady Gaga’s ‘Chromatica’ album dropped today and it’s a fever dream set in a sartorially blessed oasis — until it turns into something else completely. Naturally, we’d expect no less from an artist who surprises and shocks her fans at a near-constant rate. Taking cues, perhaps, from Madonna’s 1989 ‘Like a Prayer’ video, the new '911' vid is loaded with religious iconography including Gaga herself dressed in a modern-day Our Lady of Sorrows look (catnip for all you lapsed Catholics out there). No less than the Pope himself encouraged his followers (the IRL ones — Twitter didn’t exist then) to boycott Madonna and her music video. But like Madge, Gaga grew up in the Catholic church, and the imagery probably comes naturally to her… still, we’re waiting for a possible backlash from Gaga detractors.The video was filmed by director Tarsem Singh (The Fall, The Cell) and most certainly fits with his signature style (think: one absurdist set piece slipping away only to be replaced by another) but it’s also heavily influenced by the very film that’s screening in the movie theatre that appears late in the video: The Colour of Pomegranates. Which, of course, explains Gaga’s hallucinations.[video_embed id='2008958']RELATED: Lady Gaga announces Gaga Radio[/video_embed]Gaga herself has said that ‘911’ is about her mental health issues and her use of the prescription medication olanzapine. “I can’t always control things that my brain does — and I have to take medication to stop the process that occurs,” she said in an interview earlier this year. “I know I have mental issues and I know that they can sometimes render me non-functional as a human.”And yet once again, Mother Monster has provided fans with a piece of art to puzzle over (not to mention a killer track). ‘911’ is a video you can watch over and over again, each time uncovering new links between reality and unreality — the dream and what turns out to be the real life nightmare. Check out the full video below.
[video_embed id='-1']BEFORE YOU GO: Corgi chomps down on tasty watermelon[/video_embed]

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