The Immaculate Collection (video)

The Immaculate Collection is the second music video compilation by American singer-songwriter Madonna. Released by Warner Music Vision, Warner Reprise Video and Sire Records on November 13, 1990, to accompany the audio release, it contained music videos for the singer's singles released between 1983 and 1990. Although it did not contain all of Madonna's music videos at that point, the collection marks the first time the clip for "Oh Father" (1989) was commercially available worldwide, as it was first limited to the United States.

The Immaculate Collection received positive reviews from music critics, who saw it as a consistent collection of Madonna's videography. In the United States, the release reached number one on the Top Music Videos chart, and was certified triple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), denoting shipments of over 300,000 copies across the country. It also topped the charts in Canada and the United Kingdom. The Immaculate Collection won the prize for "Best Long Form Video" at the 1991 MTV Video Music Awards.

Background and release
By the end of the 1980s, Madonna had become the biggest female singles artist in history, with the most number-one and top-ten hit songs by a woman in both the United States and the United Kingdom. J. Randy Taraborrelli, author of Madonna: An Intimate Biography, noted that a Madonna's greatest hits album was ready by that point, serving as "a proud landmark" of her career which had progressed upwards since she entered the music scene in 1982. Following the completion of the 1990 Blond Ambition World Tour, Madonna began rushing the project aimed to be released in time for the year's Christmas season, working on new material for the album with Shep Pettibone and Lenny Kravitz. The Immaculate Collection contains fifteen previously released Madonna singles in chronological order, from "Holiday" (1983) to "Vogue" (1990). All of them were reworked using QSound by Pettibone, alongside Goh Hotoda and Michael Hutchinson. Two new songs, "Justify My Love" and "Rescue Me", were included on the album in order to generate public interest, and were later released as singles from the project.

The video album was released on VHS and LaserDisc on November 13, 1990 on the same day as the audio release, containing thirteen music videos, including the live performance of "Vogue" at the 1990 MTV Video Music Awards. A total of fourteen of Madonna's music videos were absent from the collection, notably the film soundtracks; Rikky Rooksby wrote on The Complete Guide to the Music of Madonna that the video was "far from being a complete roll-call of the videos of Madonna's numerous hit singles". He also noted that it marks the first worldwide release of the video to "Oh Father" (1989), which was originally made to support its single release in the United States. A box set titled The Royal Box was issued on December 4, 1990, containing the audio and video versions of the release, a poster, and postcards. The video was released on DVD on June 8, 1999. It was later included in the box sets The Ultimate Collection (2000), which also contained its follow-up The Video Collection 93:99 (1999), and The Madonna Collection (2000), which also included Madonna Live: The Virgin Tour (1985) and The Girlie Show: Live Down Under (1994).

Critical response
The Immaculate Collection received positive reviews from music critics. Rooksby stated that "if you don't own any Madonna videos, and you'd like to, this is probably the one to start with." Giving the release a positive review and giving five out of five stars, Russell Brown from Select magazine noted the absence of many of Madonna's videos, and felt that from "Like a Prayer" (1989), "anything subsequent had to be a let-down", but called the video for "Cherish" (1989) a "return to form", and concluded: "So there it is: good sex, bad sex, dominance, submission, money, religion, race, image, reality, sleaze and innocence. Pop culture comes no better and we should be grateful." According to Greg Kot of Chicago Tribune, the video "give[s] a good overview of Madonna's eight-year career."

Writing a review for Music Week, Selina Webb opined that from "Material Girl" (1985) onwards, "a glossy sheen replaces the do-it-yourself styling and Madonna's evolution from alternative pop bimbo to internationally acclaimed artist is brought into sharp focus", also pointing out that her most recent videos in the collection "demonstrate what can be achieved with huge budgets". Giving the release three out of five stars, Los Angeles Times' Chris Willman felt that "the imagery in almost all of the dozen clips collected here has already entered the realm of popular fantasy", but pointed out that "few of these hold up as great videos", highlighting "Open Your Heart" (1986) as the only "close-to-brilliant" video. The Immaculate Collection won "Best Long Form Video" category at the 1991 MTV Video Music Awards, in the ceremony held on September 5, 1991. However, Madonna was not a recipient as she was not the video's producer.

Commercial performance
In the United States, The Immaculate Collection debuted at number four on Billboard's Top Music Videos for the week dated December 8, 1990, and number 14 on the Top Videos Sales chart. The video compilation later reached number one of the Top Music Videos in January 1991. It also became certified triple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on September 20, 1994, denoting shipments of over 300,000 copies across the United States. After Nielsen Soundscan started tracking sales from March 1991, the video has sold 291,000 copies in the region as of 2010. Elsewhere, it topped the charts in the United Kingdom and Canada, becoming the first longform record to enter at number one on the RPM video chart in the latter country. Across Europe, the video compilation moved 300,000 units as of January 1991. Upon its release on DVD in 1999, The Immaculate Collection reached the top 10 in Denmark and the United Kingdom, while peaking within the top 20 in Greece and Portugal.

Track listing

 * Notes
 * "Lucky Star": VHS and Laserdisc editions include the original version of the video, while the DVD format includes the US remix version.
 * "Express Yourself": features an edited version of the video, which is based on the 7-inch version instead of the Shep Pettibone video remix.

Credits and personnel
Credits and personnel adapted from the liner notes of The Immaculate Collection.


 * Producers
 * Michele Ferrone ("Borderline")
 * Simon Fields ("Like a Virgin")
 * Gregg Fienberg ("Express Yourself")
 * Glenn Goodwin ("Lucky Star")
 * Bruce Logan ("Borderline")
 * David Naylor ("Papa Don't Preach", "Open Your Heart" and "La Isla Bonita")
 * Vicki Niles ("Oh Father" and "Vogue")
 * Sharon Oreck ("Material Girl", "Papa Don't Preach", "Open Your Heart", "La Isla Bonita", "Like a Prayer" and "Cherish")


 * Photography directors
 * Michael Ballhaus ("Papa Don't Preach")
 * Jordan Cronenweth ("Oh Father")
 * Andrea Dietrich ("Borderline")
 * Wayne Isham ("Lucky Star")
 * Pascal Lebegue ("Open Your Heart" and "Vogue")
 * Bryan Loftus ("La Isla Bonita")
 * Mark Plummer ("Express Yourself")
 * Steven Poster ("Like a Prayer")
 * Herb Ritts ("Cherish")
 * Peter Sinclair ("Like a Virgin" and "Material Girl")