How Has 'Mr. Brightside' Been Used In Movies Or TV Shows?

‘Don’t Let Me Down’ is another amazing song for This Is Us. It makes me sad every time it appears, but in a great way. The song matches so perfectly with the episodes where the families deal with their complicated relationships and their hidden fears. Like a character in the show, the song is also very alive and not just a background song. It’s so powerful to watch their struggles when you have gotten to know their journey throughout the series. The song is a beautiful reminder of times in our own lives when we have turned to loved ones for support.

I would suggest you start with Lanie's film "How to Build a Better Boy" which is a really fun movie to watch. Mae is a character who starts off as a control freak but learns to roll with life's messiness. Her journey is really relatable and Lanie does a great job of bringing warmth to her role as the strange girl with a robot boyfriend. The movie has a lot of heart and a lot of humor. It's just a really fun movie and it has that classic Disney Channel feel to it. It's a really good "watch on a lazy day" kind of movie.

But there are so many amazing, popular hockey romances written by self-published and indie authors as well (so, so many of them). Trying to get one of these adapted into a film or TV series would be an even more complicated journey than with a traditionally published work. Indie authors might need a literary agent who specializes in film and television rights to shop their work to producers. So a huge Amazon hit in Kindle Unlimited might never make it to the studios of Hollywood, even when published traditionally. It’s not fair but it’s reality.

There are so many small scenes which I remember, when I hear the song ‘We’ve Got Tonight’ in a movie: a declaration of love in a parking-lot, a slow dance through a kitchen, or two people finally confessing something to each other which they had been hiding for so long. The song has a compact and fine structure: from private to communal. I am very much aware, whether a scene is supported by the original version of ‘We’ve Got Tonight’ with all its gritty, nostalgic quality, or by a softer, jazzy cover version to add more vulnerability to the situation. In any case, it is a turning-point in the movie. And the best things are, when the music does all the talking, and the actors only are doing the admitting. The quiet honesty of these scenes stays with me longest.

The supporting cast is also so great that even people with only 2 lines of dialogue feel fully realized. There’s something that TV has over books in terms of immediate, embodied presence. Mary-Louise Parker is just so great as Janey, she brought a warmth to the role that the book version of Janey did not have for me.

Yooo, another video hole for me - this time a bunch of ‘Careless Whisper’ movie and anime covers. A bunch of them are by Tamaki, and while that one is nice and pretty, there’s also an instrumental version of it in that Korean drama I was watching, I think. The melody is really versatile. I suppose because the song is about guilt and cheating, it’s become sort of a generic ‘romantic’ tune - but I think that’s partly because the guilt isn’t expressed in the melody itself, it just sounds smooth and sad and sexy. So while the lyrics are one thing, the instrumental is another, and because of that it makes for really good visual media - the guilt/cheating part of the song isn’t always audible, so it’s up to the director to interpret it in whichever way suits their movie. The ‘Deadpool’ version is ironic violence, while in Naruto it’s used to portray unspoken love and promise. The song is basically a blank canvas with a specific color palette.

This is ‘The Best Things In Life Are Free’ from the film ‘Cocktail.’ Starring Tom Hanks, Elisabeth Shue and Bryan Brown. A huge hit when released as a single, the decision to include the track in the film must have been a no-brainer for the studio. It’s used diegetically throughout the movie and viewers can clearly hear it on radios and in various backgrounds in many scenes. This is different from the typical situation where a song is used over a montage of shots of a character. The use of this song in Cocktail is not just as background music to scenes, it is part of the diegesis, or the world in which the characters exist. As a result, the movie conveys the fact that the song’s philosophy is part of the culture that the characters are living in and that they are dealing with. This is a small difference from typical use of songs in films, but it is a difference that makes a large difference in terms of conveying realism in an otherwise very realistic movie. The song is not commenting on the action from outside the action, it is part of the action.

I get excited talking about this kind of messy, human drama — partner swapping and swinging show up across a surprising range of TV, from gritty dramas to trashy reality shows. If you want a show that makes that theme central, start with 'Swingtown' — it’s basically built around suburban couples in the 1970s experimenting with partner-swapping and the social ripple effects. The series treats it as a cultural phenomenon, showing both the allure and the awkward fallout, and it’s useful if you want a period piece that actually foregrounds the moral and psychological consequences. If you prefer something more contemporary and adult, 'Californication' throws that kind of storyline into the mix frequently: swinger parties, casual swapping and the chaos that ensues are part of the show's messy sexual economy. On the queer side, 'Queer as Folk' and 'The L Word' both explore non-monogamy, open relationships and moments that read like partner-exchange subplots — they approach it with different tones, one more raw and party-driven, the other more character-focused and emotionally nuanced. Reality TV leans into partner reshuffling as a mechanic: 'Temptation Island' and 'Love Island' don’t call it “swinging,” but their whole structure is designed around testing couples by exposing them to new partners and recouplings. I also think shows that aren’t strictly about swinging still dip into swap territory as a device — 'Shameless' often has tangled bedroom scenes and casual arrangements, while certain seasons of more adult dramas or supernatural shows (think parties or orgies in 'True Blood') use partner swapping for shock or to explore characters’ boundaries. Personally, I find the way each show frames it — as satire, tragedy, eroticism or social study — is what makes these plots interesting rather than just salacious.

Mostly at Warner Brothers Ranch with various other locations used for key scenes. All shooting took place on the enormous property which has several large lakes, extensive forests, and lots of wide-open space to establish a country-like setting. A fish pond would have been one of the property’s several large reservoirs. The scenes shot at the schoolhouse would have likely been shot on the ‘town’ part of the set at Warner Brothers. A small crew would have traveled to Virginia for a few specific ‘pickup shots’ of the Blue Ridge Mountains – and that was about it. They would have also shot and edited together a ton of pre-existing footage to acheive the iconic shots they needed in those scenes. Very resourceful and cost effective.

On the business side of this, it probably boiled down to Touchstone/CDisney having a cross-promotion deal with Columbia Records to market the song off of the movie. Such deals are written with exclusivity to recoup investment. Millions were spent making that song a signature part of the Disney movie and its subsequent marketing efforts. Bad branding would ensue if a competitor were allowed to utilize the song in their marketing efforts just a year or so later. Contracturally and from a strategic standpoint, it was in the best interest of Touchstone, Disney and Columbia to make the pairing of the song and movie a long-term exclusive deal. By the time the windows of exclusivity for that song would have ended, the connection had become so indelibly linked that no one would seriously consider utilizing it.