The Ghost Of You

The last music video off Revenge is The Ghost Of You. It was filmed on the 22nd and 23rd of May, 2005 in Malibu, California. This video is again directed by Marc Webb, and looks like a real movie rather than a trailer. As the song is about the fear of losing someone, the band wanted to make a video that touched on this but was at the same time quite unexpected. They felt that as the song had the word “Ghost” in the title, they would be expected to make a creepy, haunted house type video. Instead, they decided to set their music video in a Saving Private Ryan-esque, World War 2 scenario.

The video has two main scenes. During the verses, the band is shown performing with period instruments for a group of about 30 soldiers dancing with their partners. They are also shown at the bar in their dress greens as if they are drunkenly singing along to the jukebox. During the choruses, the soldiers are shown storming a beach that is occupied by the Germans. These sections are more kinetic and fast, and have a handheld camera feel to them. During the breakdown, some shots of Mikey are shown to make the audience feel more connected and attached to him. In the last part of the video, Mikey gets shot and dies before the medic (played by Ray) can save him.

The Ghost Of You was a very expensive music video, costing $500,000 to make. Gerard was very worried about the cost, as he felt he might be gambling their careers away. However, he talked to the band about his concerns, and together they decided that “We didn’t get into it for the money, so let’s make a great video.”

To make the video look like it was set during the 1940’s, Gerard had to chop off all of his hair and get a period haircut. He hadn’t cut his hair since starting the band, apart from trimming and shaping it. When they had finished cutting his hair for the video, it was as short as it had been when they started the band. Bob had to shave off his beard for the video. He was reluctant to do this, as he had had a beard for so long, but when he saw that Gerard was going to cut off all of his hair he agreed to shave his beard. Ray, Mikey and Frank all had to use bobby pins to hold their hair in place, and Mikey had to wear glasses that looked like they were from the 1940’s.

The band almost drowned while they were making this music video. The video was to include a shot of the front of the boat opening to let the soldiers out onto the beach, but they had to shoot the shot in the middle of the ocean to get the angle right. The second time they did it the door scooped up some water which put too much weight on the front of the boat. Too much water seeped in, they couldn’t shut the front, and the boat almost capsized. When commenting on the situation, Frank said “When my balls got wet, that’s when I got scared.” Despite this event, the band had to get back in the boat to keep filming. At first they were extremely hesitant, but when Ray (who can’t swim) got back in, they realised that they had to keep going.

While they were preparing for this music video, My Chemical Romance was on tour with Green Day, who had just finished shooting their video for Wake Me Up When September Ends. When Gerard heard the Green Day video recreated the war in Iraq, he was worried about how My Chem’s new video would be compared to Green Day’s video. However, Billie Joe Armstrong (lead singer of Green Day) showed him their video, and supported My Chem’s decision to make an anti-war statement.

The Ghost Of You was released as a single on August 29, 2005, and the video was premiered on the 6th of September 2005. It was very well received.