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Friday 17 February 2012

Review: Push A Little Button, 1956

Review: Push A Little Button, 1956

Here is the video



Song written by Tony Hatch, and sung by his sister Ninette Hartley, 15 at the time. Not sure who the dancer is. A glorious song, well-orchestrated. Described by some as an earworm, because once you have heard it, its hard to forget, but in a pleasant way. And the filming is tasteful, inventive and a joy to watch, every bit as addictive as the music.

Actually its a protest song. Listen carefully and you may hear it as a protest against increasing automation at the expense of people, and maybe even more. The superficial apparant childishness of the song, once you see through it, making the underlying protest all the more powerful.

It is therefore especially ironic that this original song was re-used in 2010 in an advertising video for BBC Capita. The good news is they did not use any of the beautiful original video, instead (thankfully) creating their own video, which sits at the opposite pole of artistic filmmaking talent.

Now the sad irony is, the BBC Capita advert is designed to say how easy it is to buy or renew a tv license on their website, just push your mouse button to buy or renew they say, its so easy.

Strange, the advert forgets to mention the people who paid for their tv license online and then get persecuted by BBC/Capita and then get blamed by the "BBC Trust" for, yes believe it or not, pushing the wrong button on their website.

So my recommendation is to leave the 2010 abomination unwatched, and instead revel in the beauty of the 1956 original.

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