Beastie Boys
One van, no permits, three Beastie Boys in fake mustaches driving around Los Angeles for three days. The "Sabotage" video was born at a Dirt magazine photo shoot where Spike Jonze showed up in a wig and fake mustache himself; when it came time to shoot Ill Communication's lead single, Adam Yauch told Jonze to keep the crew small enough to fit in one van. Shot for roughly $50,000 on grainy 16mm like a season-one trailer for a 1970s cop show that never existed, it references Hawaii Five-O, S.W.A.T., The Streets of San Francisco, Starsky and Hutch, and Baretta. The fake cops have names: Sir Stewart Wallace (MCA), Bobby "The Rookie" Fisher (Ad-Rock), and Cochese (Mike D). Five VMA nominations, zero wins — the Best Direction loss triggered Yauch's stage invasion as his Swiss alter ego Nathaniel Hornblower. In 2009, MTV retroactively gave it "Best Video That Should Have Won a Moonman." The band later wrote a script for a feature-length spinoff, We Can Do This, which was never made.