http://music-mix.ew.com/2011/02/17/b...e+Music+Mix%29
”Hold It Against Me,” less a music video than an endlessly anticipated, relentlessly blog-ified Video Event, has finally been held.
The verdict? It’s kind of … frantic. And not unlike the commercials for her many fragrances; call this one I Am Curious (Android).
Plus there’s the product placements for her actual fragrances, among other things—including the Gaga “Telephone” redux Plenty of Fish. Also: bullet-cased panties, a voluminous wedding dress turned splatter-paint canvas, and some hooded, twirling ninja dudes with no eyes.
The best part is undoubtedly the battle of Britney vs. Britney, in which our lady Crouching Tiger Hidden Fight Clubs her own self to the death (or narcolepsies? It’s a toss-up). Otherwise, she seems to spend a large portion of the video with the half-distracted air of a person who thinks they may have left the stove on at home.
“You just cannot deny / there’s a spark in between us,” she sings, but the spark feels imposed more by the quick edits and bravura setpieces of director Jonas Akerlund than anything else; her dance moves are scarcely shown, spliced into strobelight-second flashes of small, I’m-trapped-in-an-invisible-box movement. It’s hard not to wonder: Is Britney having any fun?