Very `Happy Portraits of Europeans

Pharrell Williams' `Happy video clearly went viral, but just from casually scanning YouTube, I think the infectiously happy music has spawned a viral number of covers, too.  It's online inspiration at its best.  Here is just a sampling of those covers that I like, and what I like has to do with good dancing, quality filming, and deft editing.

The Tatry Mountain Resort, in the High Tatras of Slovakia, is popular in both winter and summer.  It is a mountain range that also borders southern Poland, and these happy Slovaks are in Vysoká of the Eastern Tatras.  Michaela Galová, the smoldering lady in a bikini with an infectious smile and a body to die-for, steals this music video.  She also leads a group dance, and closes the festivity by blowing us a kiss.

From the Eastern High Tartras, to Western Slovakia, we arrive near the Czech border: Trenčín.  I love these videos, because we get a portrait of a city and its people: From cobblestone sidewalks and avenues, to grassy foothills and wooded clusters, Trenčín impresses me, as a non-European, as quintessentially European.  Quite a lot of history, quite a lot of spirit.

Campi Bisenzio is a municipality in the Florence Province, of the Tuscany Region, in central Italy.  It boasts the first internal combustion engine.  The filmmaker must've used a drone to capture a birds eye view of happy Italians and with both a rising and a swooping camera.  But what I like most is the synchronous lip-syncing of many dancers.  Of course, too, the viral algorithm is to install sexy ladies in bikinis as thumbnails.

Brno is the second largest city in the Czech Republic, in the historical South Moravian Region.  It is the seat of judicial authority, as the Constitutional, Supreme, and Supreme Administrative Courts are situated there.  I love the footbridges, forming natural lines to film, and simple uncrowded plazas, fit for lower angle shots.  I also love the range of dance, from ballet, to hip-hop and break dancing.  How about the dude with flaming hair, mustache and beard, and how about the pretty girl in a white dress (rf. thumbnail)?       

Angers is a city in the historic Anjou Province, in Western France.  Here, for me, it's less the panorama of the locale, and more the indoors that make up these happy folks' lives: from a radio station, music and dance halls, and museums; to gymnasiums and ice rinks; to escalators and trains.  I don't know if the Tour de France has ever passed through Angers, but again I love the portrait that this `Happy video paints.