1999: directed by Garth Jennings for Hammer & Tongs

The Viewer is advised to prepare a handkerchief if he or she has an even vaguely tender heart. The first time the Author saw this video, she cried.

On a milk carton, we see a "missing" advert with Graham's photo under it. The milk carton is sitting on the table of a house with the same photo of Graham, framed and propped against the wall, and an old man with glasses sits there in his robe and pajamas, looking as sad as sad can be. This is Graham's Video Dad. Graham's Video Mum comes over to Graham's Video Dad with a plate piled with toast; he politely shakes his head to decline. "I'm too depressed to eat, mother," GVDad says with a smile. He takes off his glasses, about to cry. GVMum bends down and puts her arm around the old guy to comfort him. When they head Dave Rowntree's perky drumroll, they look up as one. Hurrah, Dave's here!

Oh, no, it's the phone. A young girl in a pink sweater gets it, excited all through and through; is it him? It must be him! Graham's photo is in closeup. Is the Viewer's heart breaking yet? Graham's Video Sister slumps down at the table, answering in the negative to someone on the phone. Someone's calling to see if they've found Graham. They haven't. "Last we saw him he said he was going round the pub for a drink," she says, "and that was six months ago." GVSis hangs up and pouts. GVDad looks like he's going to go mad with grief unless something is done.

What can be done?

Well, the milk carton decides to do something. It gets up off the table with perky round eyes and a smile, and begins to dance around. GVDad watches the milk carton, apparently used to this kind of thing. GVSis comes and sits down at the breakfast table, her face a portrait of Glum. The milk carton begs them to cheer up, but it just plunges Graham's Video Family into ultimate despair. Now Milk Carton is depressed, too, and that's just not right. Milk Carton hops down off the table so he can get out of this gloom emporium.

Milk Carton toddles out of the house onto the patio, smiling now that he's at least doing something about this Graham problem. Milk Carton is so, so cute. Milk Carton is the kind of cute that only the Jim Henson Creature Workshop is capable of - a clean, honest cute, not sticky or cloying. While Graham's Video Family sit around in the kitchen depressed like their Prozac prescription ran out, Milk Carton is striding confidently down the street, arms swinging. His side reads: "Graham was last seen on 20/6/99. Graham is 5'11" with a slim build. He was last seen in Regents Park, London. He was carrying a 2-litre bottle of MD 20/20, a spray can, and a packet of explosives. We miss him very much. Reward for returning him to us physically intact. EMI."

On the road, there's a woman all dressed in yellow, and a baseball cap, trimming her lawn edges with a weed whacker. She looks down and sees Milk Carton, but doesn't stop weed whacking. Milk Carton runs away, understandably horrified. Baseball caps have a place, and that's a baseball diamond, and nowhere else. Milk Carton, screaming, runs right into the road, and almost gets himself flattened by a man on a motorcycle. "Get on," says the motorcyclist. Milk Carton sashays over, smiling. He's strapped on, and given a fast ride into town.

Milk Carton feels that Luck is with him today. He does a little happy dance. Milk Carton is adorable. He begins to ask random people on the street if they've seen a skinny, drunk genius. Milk Carton gets directed around. He sees a guy drinking out of a big carton of milk, and much like the Author would do, he screams in horror and runs away. Drinking milk is a terrifying thing and the Author wishes that people wouldn't do it, in the way that others wish that people did not curse in public.

This is the beginning of harsh times for Milky. He gets chased by an overenthusiastic, possibly thirsty, two-year-old girl. He passes by an empty aluminium beverage can, lying on its side and looking very tired. Milk Carton cheerfully asks after Graham, but before Aluminium Can gets a chance to answer, some wonderful human being kicks the can and it goes flying into the air, its mouth opened in a silent, heartrending scream. Milky screams too, aghast at the mindless cruelty of young boys. Milk Carton flees the scene and gets to a public phone, where, his scared little eyes all bugged out, he calls back home and talks to GVSis. She shakes her head. "Nope, Dad's still losing it - he says he's voting Tory next year," she tells Milky. Out on the back terrace, GVDad is still in his pajamas, and he's staring out at the cruel, uncaring garden, lost in a world without Graham. *sniff*

When Milky gets off the phone, he notices a little paper coupon with "Big Suzy - Makes All Your Dreams Come True, No. 37, 4th Floor" on the ground. Milk Carton, being a milk carton instead of a rocket scientist, assumes that finding Graham is the same dream as getting a ten-quid handjob from some nasty old slag. He goes to Big Suzy's place. Big Suzy answers the door in a blind rage (also a sheer negligee, black satin bra, tap pants, and kinky high-heeled boots). She looks for something to kill for interrupting the afternoon repeat of EastEnders, and looking down, she spots our Milky. She lunges for him, screeching "I'm going to pour you, bit by bit, into my scalding hot tea!" Milky makes a break for it, confused and frightened. He runs down the sidewalk, hyperventilating all the way. (Hyperventilating! A milk carton! And it's utterly believable and real! Milky is real!)

After making it back onto the streets in general, Milky looks across the street and sees a very sexy container of strawberry-flavoured milk. The Author is a longtime fan of Strawberry Quik, and Strawberry Milk has the most delicious-looking packaging - so simple, elegant, seductive. Milky, all cheerful again, does his little happy hello dance. Strawberry Milk waves back. Milky is in Big Time Love with Strawberry. But she is not pasteurised, Milky! Beware! Don't forget your quest! And then some other delightful specimen of the goodness of mankind comes along and STOMPS on Strawberry. Pink milk goes splattering everywhere. Strawberry's dead! You killed her, you bastards! Why'd'ja have to kill her? Milk Carton howls in rage and loss. Please pass me a tissue. Thank you.

Milk Carton is seriously traumatised. He runs screaming down the road. Soon it gets dark and Milky wanders the filthy back alleys alone, scared out of his wits. More aluminium cans, carved into horrible faces with pointy sharp teeth, huddle around a tiny fire. In trash cans, other cans drip red paint like blood. Plastic bottles huddled in the corner suddenly spring to life and snarl at poor Milky. Horrible green neon monsters lurking in the trash send Milky into a frozen panic. How will he ever get out of this?

A blinding light from above. Milky climbs up off of street level, not wishing to further his association with the trash, sits next to a window, and who should be playing on the other side of that window but world-famous pop group Blur! And one of the members happens to be... Graham Coxon! Who just ran off to a rehearsal and forgot to tell his worried family! It's Graham! It's Graham! When he's been the whole emotional locus of the video so far, when you see him you just want to alternately hug him to death and smack him and say "Do you have any idea how worried we were about you?" And he looks yummy in a grey hoodie and hair that's had a chance to grow out a tiny bit and now it looks smart. Damon's got on a black "Buffalo New York" sweatshirt with rainbow stripes on the elbows; he's playing his acoustic guitar with "Essex" on it in sticker letters, and singing backup. He must have had a holiday because he looks younger than he did in the previous video. And, wonder of wonders miracle of miracles, there's a keyboard right in front of him. Dave's playing behind a very nice drumkit and a wicker basket. Alex is sitting down again, grinning his ass off and getting down. And he's washed his hair, which was nice of him.

Milk Carton is understandably ecstatic. He presses himself against the window pane so hard it falls inward, and he on it, into the room. Graham bends down and picks up the milk carton, reads it, and rubs his hand over his mouth in slight embarassment. "Oops, they think I'm missing. I wonder if I can tell them that I just didn't have change for the phone?" Graham's Video Family look up from their dark breakfast of malaise. Graham realises the error of his ways, and decides to leave band practise in the middle of the song without even saying anything to anyone. No wonder people think he's gone missing all the time.

We see the tops of Graham's underpants, hanging onto his little waist for dear life while his jeans go sagging down. He needs a sandwich. We see the very chipper Alex playing with a cigarette in front of him, extremely well fed, having apparently eaten Graham's bit whenever Graham didn't want it. "I'm rich," says Alex, "I don't have to shave or cut my hair anymore, and you can't make me, and even if I'm fat and unwashed, the chicks'll still dig me." And he's right. Graham runs to catch the first bus of the morning, leaving in a pink-tinted dawn. Back at the practise space, no one seems to notice that they've lost their lead vocalist and lead guitarist, and actually seem perfectly happy to be rid of him.

Graham sits on the bus, contemplating the milk carton, who has gone back to being a smiling inert object. The bus lets him off in front of his Video Family's house. Back in the practise space, Damon attacks his keyboard with his two forefingers, bent over more than double to reach it. Hunt and peck keyboards? It's not going to work. Graham walks up to the house. Drinking the milk. He's drinking Milky. Milky will die if you drink him, Graham. Graham polishes Milky off and then tosses his drained carcass into the bin. With the clear conscience of the sociopath, he walks into the house; GVDad and GVMum are looking in the wrong direction, and they have to run over to greet him.

Coming out of the bin, we see Milky drag himself up. His eyes are heavy-lidded (he's been drunk, see.. heh heh) and his body is crumpled, but he's smiling. He's done the deed. He waves weakly, then falls back into the bin. No! Milky! No! Milky's disembodied spirit, handily supplied with wings, rises gently out of the bin to the tune of Damon's worshipful organ. Milky rises up, far away from the concerns of the corporeal world, and in the infinite clouds, he is joined once again by his dead true love, Strawberry Milk.

CUTE FACTOR: Graham is beautiful in this video, Damon and Dave are not half bad, and Alex is just a shame.
VIDEO QUALITY: Hammer and Tongs has been responsible for some of the most innovative videos of the last few years. According to the above linked interview, this video cost almost £100.000 to make and every penny is worth it. It's just so great.
FUCKED UP FACTOR: Damon and Alex look really pretty high.
OVERALL GRADE:A+