A creative mind rarely lets budget constraints get in their way. YouTuber Matthew Highton has tapped into that late 90's nostalgia with his latest endeavor. Using nothing but publicly available stock footage, he has recreated the opening credits sequence from the TV show Friends, and the results are surprisingly faithful.
Highton's YouTube channel, while primarily focused on various comedy sketches and edits, has recently pivoted towards a more specialized style: He meticulously matches stock footage to the original sequence of a given show. Having already tackled shows like Happy Days and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, he has now set his sights on that NBC and Netflix darling, Friends.
A "comedian, filmmaker and weirdo" according to his Twitter bio, Highton arguably lives up to all three when it comes to his stock footage videos. They are snappy, precise, and just strange enough to make the viewer question why they're laughing. The Friends video is no different, utilizing shots of children, mimes, and everything in between to match the timing and cadence of the original with surprising accuracy.
Anyone who has taken a shot at video editing will likely already know how long and tedious of a process it can be for even the most exciting of projects. Many will appreciate how much time and effort it must have taken to line all the clips up with the multitude of cuts the Friends opening sequence boasts. However, what is perhaps more impressive is the sheer variety in the stock footage used. One might scarcely think about such things under normal circumstances. But seeing something like a child tugging on his ears followed by a man dropping a bag in fear in front of a green screen may prompt the question "what don't they have stock footage of?"
The video is filled with clever choices and amusing juxtapositions. In fact, some of its biggest laughs possibly come from seeing each character being portrayed by multiple people in the span of seconds. The humor is amplified in such moments as when Jennifer Aniston's Rachel is first seen as a smiling woman with a drink and then immediately followed by a child confidently strutting out of a store with her shopping bags. Many may argue that the best comedy comes from the unexpected, and it's hard to disagree after seeing Highton's work.
Source: Matthew Highton/Twitter