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→Music Video
[[Mark Romanek]], who also directed "[[Closer]]", directed the [[Nine Inch Nails music videos|music video]] for "The Perfect Drug" in 1997. It was one of the most expensive videos at the time, costing over $850,000 to make. Two sets were built and numerous props were involved.[http://www.nin-pages.de/perfect_drug_video_quelle.htm]
The concept of the video is widely interpreted as Trent Reznor portraying a man mourning the death of a child and detaching himself from reality through absinthe. [[Charlie Clouser]], [[Danny Lohner]], and [[Chris Vrenna]] appear in the video, most notably playing string instruments at the beginning of the video. The aesthetics were heavily influenced by the illustrations of 20th-century artist Edward Gorey (1925–2000), the most obvious reference coming from the girl sitting on the cushion in front of the painting. The entire video was filmed with a blue tint with the exception of the drum breakdown, which uses flashing green light instead, representing Reznor losing himself in the absinthe.
In a 2025 post to Instagram[https://www.instagram.com/markromanek/reel/DE6RRDhpVrF/], following the death of ''Lost Highway'' director [[David Lynch]], Romanek posted the following: