Before their hair-raising, curse-strewn telephone calls were the talk of the tabloids, Oksana Grigorieva and Mel Gibson made a music video together. Mel directed Oksana dodging flying knives and writhing rhapsodically in a fire. In retrospect? Kinda creepy.

Mel's label distributed Oksana's album. And it was Mel who directed a little-noticed, highly cheesy, and retrospectively eerie music video for her in 2009.

[There was a video here]

"Beautiful Heartache" opens to a stealthy Grigorieva slinking across the room in the direction of a grand piano. Her cherry lips parted and gleaming, she sways her head side to side like a lady in a commercial for Dove chocolate. Dancers tango with a red rose between them. ("I will bury you in the rose garden"?) Suddenly, the scene shifts: Oksana stands chained to a wall in a blonde wig and the dress of a circus performer. A mustachioed man flings a dagger at her. With a thunk it hits the wall nary an inch from her beautiful face. A second dagger she plucks from the air before it hits her face—then eyes her assailant, smirking. ("You're going to answer one day, boy, you're going to answer"?) Enraptured, Oksana sweeps her fingers across the piano and—did she have lighter fluid in her fingertips?—everything lights on fire. Contrary to Mel's threat that "I'll burn the goddamn house down, but you will blow me first," there is no oral sex at this conflagration, just sultry music and dashing tango dancers with slicked-back hair.

If it's any comfort, these images probably haunt Mel's nightmares: His "bitch, cunt, whore" ex-girlfriend surviving his every attempt to destroy her.

[Thanks to reader Annitra for helping us dig this gem up.]