Bits n' Pieces

For those of us who don’t know our spark plugs from our elbows, a rather handy trend has emerged in recent vehicle advertising. Whereas once it was all about the flashy motor screaming through the burning fields, now manufacturers seem hell bent on showing us just what goes into our petrol guzzlers. With the speedy arrival of Publicis and Partizan’s rip-roaring ‘Race’ for Renault, we at The Reel thought it time to investigate the growing trend of car component commercials.

Remember Cog? The Honda ad that had everyone screaming ‘Genius!’ from the rooftops? Course you do, because it won loads and everyone’s been banging on about it since its auspicious debut in 2003. Featuring a series of contraptions carrying momentum from push-me to pull-you, W+K's ad earned a certain notoriety alongside the plaudits due to claims that it half-inched the idea from 1987 film Der Lauf Der Dinge -http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfEkPgfA7wo. Whilst the two films are remarkably similar in their conceit, the fact that Cog consists entirely of the Accord's inner workings marks it out as an inspired piece of design boasting – look how smoothly the pieces of our car work together even outside of the sleek chassis.

Fast forward to 2008 and we have an entire orchestra made of bumpers and windscreen wipers playing us an Ode To Ford. Surfing on a wave of ‘big’ musical commercials that have entered the fray of late (Sony Walkman’s ‘Music Pieces’ and, yep, Honda’s ‘Choir’ take your bows), the piece contains all of the string, reed and brass instruments you can throw a baton at. Whilst certainly being an eye(and ear)catching spot for the brand, we can’t help but feel that Ogilvy’s ad lacks the oomph to mark it out above the rest, and perhaps sounds a little too good (not doubting its authenticity, honest!).

Finally we have the brand-spanking new part-wars spot for Renault. Again choosing to take the bits and bobs out of the shiny casing and into the viewer’s gaze, the ad pits shock-absorbers against fuel-injector in a battle to the garage. Dynamic and instantly engaging, the spot has a likeable concept – the car’s so awesome its pieces race to be in it – and features smart visual effects that leave us waiting for a big screen 3D version. Whilst lacking the innovative twist of Honda’s masterpiece, the spot proves that as far as TV advertising goes, us punters love seeing what’s in our chariots.

NewsReel 21/02/08

On the Radar
Music video champions Radar recently ran a competition for filmmakers to submit music videos for various well known bands and artists. One of the bands was The Maps, and winner Joe Brener made a promo for their track ‘To The Sky’. Joe’s prize was £1,000 cold hard cash, mentoring from Draw Pictures, a space on the YouTube global front page, and...he’s just got married. You can’t win them all!




The winners from the Radar and Coke Music competition have also been making waves.
Radar collaborated with Coke Music to create videos for their four top rated bands, inviting film-makers to pitch for the honour of having their creative associated with one of the foursome from the fizzy drink’s new music site. The winning videos can be viewed here.


Short and Sweet
As ever, Short and Sweet was east and west this week, with work from Vanessa Caswill, Steve May, Daniel Mulloy, Robert Chiu, Dom Bridges, Eric Toubel, Thomas Castellani, Yves D’incau and Clement Renaudin, and Philip Van. There was also a special performance from poet and comic Richard Tyrone Jones.

MONDAY: Cafe 1001, 91 Brick Lane

TUESDAY: AKA Bar, 18 west central street

Films START: 7pm both nights!

Additional dates for the diary are 3,4 and 10,11 March for special Short and Sweet nights featuring the nominations from this year's Short Film and Short Animation BAFTA categories.

The Whitehouse moves
No, George W Bush hasn’t decided to re-locate the US Presidential home; the London branch of premier editing house with the same name has upped sticks to 21-23 Meard Street, London, UK W1F 0EY – so update those Christmas card lists!

AICP Show second entry deadline
Over the Atlantic, the second entry deadline for the 2008 AICP Show, The Art & Technique of the American Commercial is February 29th, 2008, for work airing February 4, 2008 – February 24, 2008. This is the first time since the Show's inception in 1992 that there has been a second eligibility period.

The structure was introduced this year to allow work created for, and airing, during the Oscars telecast to be considered for the 2008 Show. Work can be entered at www.aicp.com.

The Association of Independent Commercial Producers Show is on June 3rd at The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City. Robert Fernandez, CEO/Partner at Moxie Pictures, is the Show Chairman. Honoured work becomes a part of the permanent archive of the Department of Film at MoMA, which is good but not as good as being featured on The Reel, folks!

Nifty website
If you hate boring retail websites and crave something a little different, take a look at this. We like so we share.

http://producten.hema.nl/

CORRECTION

In the NewsReel post entitled 'Don’t be coy, be Coy!' we wrongly reported that Therapy Films were defunct. We can only apologise for this error on our part and are pleased to confirm that they are still very much alive and well and we look forward to featuring some great new work from them soon. In the meantime, for more information on what's going on at Therapy, please visit www.therapyfilms.com

adidas

Adidas is a name synonymous with youth culture, sporting excellence and urban cool. It has been the chosen apparel of some of the greatest athletes in the world and has also been the subject matter of many a hip hop legends lyrical content. But the unassuming beginning’s of the sporting giant is a story that has not been explored by the brand during its lifespan, and is now the focus of its latest TVC and impending anniversary.

The legacy that the diffident Dassler brothers have left is a mighty one. There humble beginnings in a kitchen produced a sports giant that still is the only real rival to Americas sporting hulk that is NIKE. Aolf (Adi) Dassler was originally trained as a baker and began to produce his own sports shoes in his mothers wash kitchen after his return from world war I. Enlisting the help of his brother Rudolf (who later went on to found another sports behemoth – PUMA) they worked to equip several athletes with their newly designed spiked running shoes at the 1928 Olympics. After several victorious runs from athletes (notably the American Sprinter Jesse Owens) wearing the adidas footwear, the foundation for the international expansion of the company had been set.

Early adidas TVC’s lacked the street smarts of the modern brand image that we have grown accustomed too, and as you can see here – are fairly hilarious.



But fortunately for the awkward CEO Horst Dassler, this was all about to change. Cue the eighties and the birth of Hip Hop, adidas was about to be given an injection of street cred that it never had before. The four pillars of the discipline: Breakdancing, Graffiti Art, MCing and DJing all demanded that you be rocking a fresh pair of sneakers. Most sportswear brands were adopted by Hip Hop devotees, but only one would have a fetishistic ode lyrically illustrated at length by the legendary trio Run DMC.



So adidas had captured the attention of a cultural movement that would define a generation, whilst maintaining its sporting roots at the same time. This was a solid base to build upon and the next twenty years saw adidas solidify its hardcore sports image whilst maintaining its musical and cultural capital at the all important street level.





Even the last couple of years has seen adidas snatch another attempt at being immortalized in another musical movement with UK grime artist J2K and loudmouth chav Lady Soverigns impetuous endorsement / single ‘hoody’.





This week saw the launch of 180 Amsterdam and Stink’s new execution ‘Adi Dassler’ which takes the brand away from brash artist / athlete endorsements and instead focuses on the man who made it all happen in the first place. As a tribute to Dasslers innovative nature and history, this sparkling little animated piece adds a touch of fairytale to the ongoing adidas story.
For a look at adidas commercials throughout the years, click here.

NewsReel 14/02/08

Remember to keep sending in all your adland news - even if it is just shameless self promotion - and we'll do our best to feature it here. Please send all press releases or anything that could fall under the banner of news to sam@thereel.net.

BAFTAs
Among the great and good of last Sunday’s BAFTA winners was ‘The Golden Compass’ for Achievement in Special Effects. Regular Reel resident Framestore CFC contributed key VFX work to the project and their VFX Supervisor Ben Morris was part of the contingent that went up to accept the award. That was not the only award that went to friends of The Reel; Aardman were victorious with their Luis Cook directed short ‘The Pearce Sisters’, which won the award for Best Short Animation.

Attia’s in Oursin
Caroline Attia, a director specialising in animation, has joined the roster of French production company OursinFilms. Her idiosyncratic style of animation can be viewed here.

New Spies
Toronto based Spy Films, home to previous Reel Ones to Watch Trevor Cawood, have added Lena Beug and David Drebin to their directors roster. Photographer Drebin is delving into moving pictures for the first time and Irish filmmaker Beug has previously won Best International New Director at the 2005 Shark Awards and garnered recognition for her MTV ‘Intro Guy’ campaign.



Phil Griffin is Rockhard
Phil Griffin, formerly of Anonymous Content, has joined Rockhard Films, Los Angeles, for spot and music video representation in the U.S. and Canada.

Recent music videos include ‘Rehab’ and ‘Back to Black’ for ‘complicated’ singing sensation and tabloid favourite Amy Winehouse, along with videos for Paul McCartney, Prince, Bon Jovi, and a dance extravaganza for Basement Jaxx.

In 2007, Phil made his foray into commercial directing, and has since directed spots for clients including Tk Maxx, GHD (featuring Helena Christensen), and Max Factor.

Phil Griffin joins the current roster of Rockhard Films, which houses Marc Klasfeld, Ray Kay, Keir McFarlane, Rob Pearlstein, and Tony Petrossian.


Don’t be coy, be Coy!
Mark Denton, formerly one third of Therapy Films, has set up Coy! More news of the sure to be exciting new London based production company will follow next week.

Badland
Rapper, businessman and Mr Beyonce Knowles, Shawn Carter, aka Jay-Z aka Hova aka Jigga Man, can now add Chairman of Translation Advertising to his list of monikers. We’re not sure if we’ll be crediting ‘Translation Advertising’ as the agency on any spots on The Reel any time soon, but hey, you all just got a little something in common with a hip hop legend and that’s gotta’ be newsworthy.

Caaaaars, they’re multiplying; it’s electrifying
Strictly speaking it’s not really news; more of a prediction, but who’d want to bet against this startling bit of computer generated animation finding its way in some shape or form into a car ad sometime soon? This was the second effort utilising the unique technology - that has since continued up to a 4k Project in the space of a year - but we think this is the best looking example. View it after the jump.

The 1k Project II

Lights, camera, SuperBowl

So the US ad fest (with a bit of sport thrown in) Superbowl Sunday has been and gone, and the advertising blogs of the world have chosen their picks of the best and worst. As you know, we at the Reel like to be a bit different. You can check out the latest international on the website if you want to see our faves (Coca Cola ‘It’s Mine’ step into the light) and check out YouTube if you want the tut (bad Salesgenie, bad). You can even hold your horses until our fabbo February edition comes out, featuring 10 of the best with an expert editorial (not us, in case you were wondering, but Strawberry Frog’s virtuoso Phil Conway). Because of this we thought we wouldn’t bore you with the normal ad-talk and instead pass comment on the cheeky thirty-seconders slotted in between the beverage, tech and finance commercial overload – the movie trailers.

As well as telling us which fizzy-pop is hot to trot, the ad-breaks during the Superbowl give us a good indication of popcorn fodder hitting our cineplexes in the upcoming months. This year brands got in on the act too, with Will Ferrell’s new creation Jackie Moon (from the upcoming Semi-Pro) talking of his love for Bud Light. We have to say we preferred Ricky Bobby’s Big Red commercial from Talledega Nights, but for Ferrell fans the spot seemed to be a big hit, with blog entries sprouting up all over the place.

A much better example of custom-made Superbowl cinematic was on display with Pixar’s trail for their approaching Wall-E. Harking back to the good ol’ Luxo Junior, the spot features the movie’s titular hero having troubles with a hoover. Again demonstrating that they could make a tin of beans endearing, Pixar manage to get the audience to fall in love with the Johnny-5-alike in a matter of seconds. Even sweeter is the fact that Toy Story’s Buzz and Woody have adopted the pose of many a Yank during the game – slouched in front of the TV surrounded by snacks.

Other future treats presented were Lord of the Rings wannabe Price Caspian (bring on the Dawn Treader, that’s what we say), Robert Downey Jr sliding on metal tights for Iron Man (bring on Obadiah Stane, that’s what we say) and Wanted (just bring it on, that’s what we .. oh never mind). Playing in front of 97.5 million viewers and costing an estimated $2.7million per 30-seconds, the trails are bound for summer blockbustering. It’s also interesting to see a few more cross-over/custom made spots appearing – no doubt hoping that targeted approach would mark the movies out from the usual cinematic trailer cut-downs. As interesting for the future-blockbusters that were missing as for the ones that were shown (The Dark Night notable in its absence – whether for the tragic loss of Heath Ledger or a choice to focus on the excellent viral campaign), Superbowl XLII made sure the cinephiles were given something to treat them between the plays.