Benny Mardones passed away a couple of days ago from Parkinson’s disease at the age of 73.
This thread is not to memorialize him, but to remember him as the person responsible for the creepiest, most pervy music video ever made. I realize that 1980 was literally four decades ago but even then there had to be lines and somehow this video didn’t break them.
Littering is still a problem, but that was pretty blatant.
Oy. I’ve never seen that before. He somehow looks even worse than I pictured him. And the girl looks about 14.
Somehow, I think I’m missing something.
If you think this is the most creepiest, perverted video made, you haven’t seen too many videos.
What is it that’s supposed to be creepy? That the girl “looks about 14”?
I’m not defending it. I just don’t see it. Sure the song is trying to justify the relationship. The SONG is creepy. But the song isn’t the video.
I know a girl 16 when she hooked up with this guy 9 years older than her. Her parents hated the guy. Heck, I might have beat him up, if she were my daughter.
They’ve been married 45 years now.
Speaking only for myself, it’s not the video, per se, that I find unpleasant. I’ve always hated the song since it first came out because to my 14 year old self, it was corny and boring. The big bummer that was played in between the fun, bouncy songs. My dislike of the song itself coupled with the named “Benny” just made me picture the singer as a loser. In the video, Mr. M. does not disappoint. I am surprised they have an actress that looks so young. Usually it’s the other way around; twenty somethings playing teenagers.
As to the dating age disparity; I dated a 23 year old when I was sixteen. With my parents permission. 
I have to admit I like the song, and have since it first came out, when it appealed to my teenage romantic streak (it’s even on my iPod - don’t you judge me!). But the older the guy and the younger the girl, the pervier it gets.
That said, may he rest in peace.
If he just died at the age of 73, he was 33 when the video came out. A 17 year age gap is pretty pervy.
But those flying carpet special effects were pretty groundbreaking for the time 
The idea of 18 as an absolute age on consent wasn’t established as a cultural idea back in 1980, so the ‘guy in his 30s with a 16 year old’ didn’t hit the same creepy buttons that it does now. While the idea that 18 is the cutoff for ‘adult’ is very common today, it’s still not actually true legally. Numerous US states actually have a 16 age of consent, as do Germany, France, the UK, and Canada to name a few others from a quick google search.
I don’t disagree that the video reads ‘creepy’ to me (and most people) now, but it didn’t cross the ‘unacceptable’ line in 1980 and doesn’t even cross the ‘illegal’ line everywhere now. There were a lot of songs up until the 80’s where adult male musicians sang about their love or lust for under-18 girls, so this doesn’t stand out particularly.
A skeevy-looking guy in his mid-thirties creeping through the window of what appears to be a catatonic, 14 year-old girl’s bedroom would be creepy in any century. Unless it’s an introduction to a personal relationship with Jesus, showing her a love ‘like she’s never seen’ is also problematic.
Last time this song came up, someone linked to a defense of the song by Mardones. He claimed that it was based on a platonic relationship with a neighbor’s daughter. It seemed like a stretch, and everything in the video contradicts it.
Yeah, I turned 15 in 1980. A girl about my age back then getting hit on by a 33 year old guy, or worse yet, hooking up with him, would have seemed as creepy then as now.
Ya know, if he keeps moaning like that her father’s going to hear!
I think he’s far enough away in the front hall, waiting to answer the door and lip sync again if he has to.
Guess you missed the fact I said a music video, huh.
Yeah, the history of songs (and accompanying videos) and popular entertainment disagrees with your experience. In 1958, Elvis in his 20s started dating a 14 year old girl. This was controversial, but didn’t ruin his career. In 1967, a 27 year old Neil Diamond released “Girl, You’ll be a Woman soon” to reach the top 10 on the pop chart. In 1968, a 25 year old Mick Jagger released “Stray Cat Blues” about lusting after a 15 (often 13 in concert) year old groupie. In 1977, “Christine Sixteen” sung by a 30 year old Gene Simmons of KISS ranked 25 on the Billboard charts. Kip Winger at 27 released “She’s only Seventeen” in 1988 and hit 26 on Billboard.
While they might not have been in the specific ‘mid-30s and 16’ lineup at the time of release, all of the hits were kept in rotation for a decade or more, so they did feature the age gap in this song (and a larger one later). You just don’t generally see songs by adult singers lusting after 13-17 year old girls, or adults dating 14-year-olds and remaining a popular musician today, as far as I’m aware - do these still make the charts?
While it might have been ‘creepy’ to see in person or for you as an individual, I don’t see how you can contend that it ‘crossed the line’ back then when songs like the above were considered fine when sung by singers with an equal or larger age gap. The general cultural opinion of older guys with under-18 girls has shifted a lot.
I’ve definitely heard the song before, but never really paid attention to the lyrics. (I rarely pick up on song lyrics unless I see them in print.)
Never seen the video before, but agree it is definitely pervy. Guy looks to be in his mid-30s; girl looks like she’s 14. And he’s a litterbug.
And yet none of them had videos that were creepy.
Hell, Kip Winger didn’t even touch his bass strings in his video, let alone any jailbait!
So I shorthanded. I meant MUSIC video, and no, that isn’t even close to the creepiest MUSIC video I’ve ever seen. It’s downright tame.
Cite?
It’s a different style of pervy but I thought Blurred Lines by Robin Thicke was worse. I was actually turned off by the nudity. He took some of the most beautiful women in the world and reduced them to slabs of meat.
The song is a piece of crap. Regardless of the lyrics or the video it’s an offense.