Jazzin' for Blue Jean is a 21-minute short film featuring David Bowie and directed by Julien Temple. It was created to promote Bowie's single "Blue Jean" in 1984 and released as a video single. The film won the 1985 Grammy Award for "Best Video, Short form", which proved to be Bowie's only competitive Grammy Award during his lifetime.
Plot
The film depicts the adventures of the socially incompetent Vic as he tries to win the affections of a beautiful girl by claiming to personally know her favourite rock star, Screaming Lord Byron. Rightfully disbelieving him, she challenges Vic to introduce her to him. They make a date for a Screaming Lord Byron show, where Vic attempts to sneak backstage to convince a cowering, paranoid Mr. Screaming to come say hello to him and the girl after the show. Screaming does come to Vic's table after the show and says hello to him and the girl, but the girl and Screaming Lord Byron have already met, and she leaves with the rock star instead of Vic. As they drive off, Bowie breaks the fourth wall and asks the director why the story changed from his concept.
Three different Bowie songs are played during the video, namely "Don't Look Down,", "Warszawa" and "Blue Jean". The video footage playing in the pub is from the performance in the club at the conclusion of the film. Bowie takes the opportunity at several points in this film to poke fun at himself and his career – particularly his history of drug abuse, his relationships with groupies, and the commercialization of his music. Kinder self-references are also present, such as the song "Warszawa" being played backstage to soothe Mr. Screaming while he's applying his makeup.
Releases
The film was released on home video on VHS and Betamax formats by Sony Home Video in North America, EMI/Picture Music International in the UK, and on Laserdisc by Pioneer Artists in Japan and North America The video later appears as an easter egg hidden on the Best of Bowie DVDs. It is slightly modified: in the club where the girl is watching a Screaming Lord Byron video, the screen originally showed footage of the very same concert she and Vic would later attend. On the DVD version, a different promotional video for the song is overlaid on the screen – this is also the trigger for another easter egg, which is itself that alternate video. The portion of the movie where Screaming Lord Byron performs the song "Blue Jean" in front of the crowd was used as the standard-length music video and clocks in at just over three minutes. This short music video is a straight edit out of Jazzin' For Blue Jean and later appeared on 1993's David Bowie - The Video Collection.
