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Some might initially be led to believe that Sabrina Carpenter’s video for her third single from Short n’ Sweet, “Taste,” is Quentin Tarantino-oriented with its cautionary opening title card (in a Tarantino-y font), “Parental Advisory and Viewer Warning: The following video contains explicit content and depicts graphic violence which may be offensive to some viewers. Viewer discretion is advised.” But no, it becomes quickly apparent that the Dave Meyers-directed video is a full-on homage to 1992’s Death Becomes Her. And while many attempts at homage in music videos turn out to be mere shot-for-shot re-creations (see: Iggy Azalea and Charli XCX’s “Fancy” or Ariana Grande’s “thank u, next”), Carpenter chooses to riff on the Death Becomes Her concept rather than totally copy each scene.
Thus, the video begins with a close-up on a “girlie bed” contrasted by “masc” accoutrements like guns and knives, with Meyers sure to give an extra-long pause on the Prada lipstick (brand partnerships are so important, n’est-ce pas?). All the while, Carpenter creepily sings, “Rock-a-bye baby, snug in your bed/Right now you are sleeping/And soon you’ll be…dead.” Carpenter then wields one of the knives as a mirror while applying her lipstick, wanting to look her best before infiltrating her ex’s mansion with a machete. Trotting into the bedroom to find her ex and his new girlfriend sleeping (it reeks of the Betty Broderick narrative), Carpenter is unpleasantly surprised to find that the female body she starts to hack away at is filled with feathers instead of guts. Turns out, Ortega was waiting for her to show up and came prepared with a shotgun as her own weapon of choice.
It’s here that the Death Becomes Her reference becomes clear, with Ortega—the Madeline Ashton (Meryl Streep) to Carpenter’s Helen Sharp—shooting a hole right through Carpenter’s stomach and sending her flying right over the balcony. When Ortega looks over it to see the resulting carnage, it becomes obvious that they’ve deviated from the original Death Becomes Her scene in opting to have Carpenter also land on two stakes in the white-picket fence that “padded” her fall. Carpenter might be down, but she’s not out, ready for instant revenge by lobbing a knife right into Ortega’s eye and flipping her the bird afterward.
At the hospital where Carpenter manages to be outfitted with a pink “sexy” gown featuring white polka dots complemented by her thigh-high tights and heels, Ortega then comes for her revenge. And it’s here that the most obvious Tarantino tribute enters the fray, with Ortega dressed in the same nurse ensemble as Elle Driver (Daryl Hannah), complete with a white eyepatch that has a red cross detail on it. Defibrillating Carpenter into oblivion, Ortega has hardly seen the last of her as she reappears at her ex’s house that night, watching them from outside as they get all romantique by the fire.
Carpenter quickly puts a pin in those plans (voodoo doll pun intended) by pulling out a voodoo replica of Ortega and bending its body in the most cringeworthy ways. Laughing to herself as she bashes Ortega’s doll head against a bush, Carpenter is rudely interrupted by the sudden appearance of another doll Ortega happens to have—one that, quelle surprise, resembles Carpenter (mainly because it’s blonde). Thus, she tosses the doll into the fireplace, in turn, causing Carpenter’s body to burst into flames.
Things continue to escalate when, in the next scene, Carpenter attacks Ortega while she’s in the shower with this mid white guy (played by Rohan Campbell), who’s mostly just a trophy for these two women (much like Ernest Menville [Bruce Willis] in Death Becomes Her) as opposed to someone they actually seem to care about all that much. Conveniently, Ortega happens to be packing a scythe while in the shower, hacking away at Carpenter’s arm before chasing her back down the stairs and tackling/wrestling her.
Convinced she’s finally won this time, Ortega is shown blissfully kissing Mid White Guy as the lyrics, “Well, I heard you’re back together and if that’s true/You’ll just have to taste me when he’s kissin’ you/If you want forever, I bet you do/Just know you’ll taste me too,” play in the background. Thus, it’s only right to hit that point over the head by having Mid White Guy turn into Carpenter while Ortega is in the midst of making out with him—fulfilling many a wet dream (though nothing will ever compare to the iconicness of the Madonna-Britney (and yes, Xtina) “union” at the 2003 VMAs), to be sure.
While viewers might be titillated by the image, Ortega is anything but, whipping out a chainsaw to cut at Carpenter’s body anew, sending her backwards into the pool as she makes a bloody splash. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately), it turns out to be a witchy trick on Carpenter’s part, as she then suddenly appears behind Ortega to watch Mid White Guy’s body sink to the bottom of the pool. It only takes a few seconds for Ortega to look “not that mad” about it.
After all, this dude was so generic that all he can be referred to at the funeral is “Beloved Boyfriend.” And while the woman who must be his mother (hence, all the over-the-top sobbing) is noticeably upset about it, Ortega looks over at Carpenter with an almost grateful look in her eye as the two smile at one another and leave.
For the final scene, Ortega and Carpenter are shown walking down some steps together sipping from either coffee or smoothie drinks (maybe Erewhon’s Short n’ Sweet smoothie?) as they kiki about “Beloved Boyfriend,” with Carpenter noting, “I mean, clingy. Lots of trauma, lots of trauma.” “Very insecure,” Ortega chimes in. Carpenter laughs, “’Very insecure!’ You kill me.” While it might not have the exact ending of Death Becomes Her (with Madeline and Helen opting to remain bitter frenemies rather than close besties), it does conclude with both of them at their ex’s funeral. And what better way to forge a lasting friendship than that?
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Genna Rivieccio
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