(By "Adweek Blogs") The recession is over. Maybe. The ad world certainly hopes so, having shed an estimated 46,000 jobs during the Great Recession. The lucky few who remain are breathing a sigh of relief and looking forward to a new reality of tighter budgets and more scrutiny given to frivolous expenses. So, where does that leave Cannes, the industry's pre-eminent annual boondoggle? The festival and award show, which saw a steep drop in attendees last year, announced the opening of 2010 registration by trumpeting a price freeze: A full-week pass will cost $3,100—not chump change, but no higher than last year. Of course, there are other costs associated with sashaying around the Riviera with the industry's movers and shakers. You have to factor in airfare, obscenely expensive hotels and the odd $32 …
Suicide: still not the best advertising theme
Retrieved 236 Days Ago
(By "Adweek Blogs")
Oh goody, another suicide ad. What is it about cars that leads people to the suicide theme? You'll recall that Volkswagen disowned a rogue suicide-bomber spec commercial four years ago. General Motors had no such choice after airing its disastrous suicidal-robot spot in the 2007 Super Bowl. Now comes a presumably unauthorized (or at least deniable) Audi spot showing a man in a parking garage trying to kill himself by attaching a hose to his tailpipe. Wouldn't you know it, to his profound dismay, the diesel-powered Audi won't produce enough toxic exhaust to do the job. Bummer. The on-screen copy reads, "Clean diesel technology. Good for the environment. Good for you." We're left with a cheery shot of the man closing the car window on his neck. My question: Has the suicide motif ever …
Sony packs company ethos into 90 seconds
Retrieved 236 Days Ago
(By "Adweek Blogs")
Director Noam Murro throws everything but the kitchen sink into this epic 90-second cinema spot from 180LA that takes us through the four worlds of Sony: electronics, music, film and games. The fifth might be bankruptcy, as this clip clearly cost serious coin. There's no denying it's visually impressive and probably causes seizures and orgasms when viewed on the big screen. I think our young hero may have bought some drugs in that alley. The tagline is "make.believe," and you pronounce the "dot." The company says: " 'Believe' represents ideas and ideals, while 'make' represents the ability to turn those ideas into reality. The dot in the middle is the place where inspiration meets creativity, where creativity meets reality." Next time, they should get Michael Bay to direct. He'd add …
Victims speak up in Burnett's Amnesty spot
Retrieved 236 Days Ago
(By "Adweek Blogs")
Leo Burnett in Venezuela worked with six different directors on this intense Amnesty International appeal. "We work for those who know more about human rights. The ones who don't have any," says the line at the end. And those are exactly the folks who explain in the spot what Amnesty is and does—the twist being that their testimonies come as they're tortured, abused and held captive. In a sense, this is empowering, since they speak out at the precise moment when their tormenters would wish them to suffer in silence. This device, along with the quick-shifting scenarios and contrasting visual styles, commands attention and gives the ad extra bite. The unnerving ending seals the deal. A girl says a bedtime prayer as a figure approaches in the background. We never learn her fate—which, …
Durex China ad explores a world of orgasms
Retrieved 236 Days Ago
(By "Adweek Blogs")
Warning: Audio is NSFW. A condom video presenting female orgasms from around the world? You know you want to watch. Except, there's nothing to see. Just a black screen with audio and titles like "Ingenue," "Gaspingly" and "Sobbingly." Yeah, I've heard a lot of sobs through the years from women in my bed, though for different reasons. There's also "Lamblike," which, from the sound of it, goes a tad heavy on the mint jelly. As for "American Style," well, on Jersey Shore, or in the apartment next door to mine on a Saturday night, maybe. Durex is the advertiser, China is the country of origin. Ads of the World credits Exis for creative development. It's NSFW. But you knew that was coming. —Posted by David Gianatasio
(By "Adweek Blogs")
Self-conscious cheapness and intentional irony do not always a good campaign make. Such is the case with this well-intentioned but off-target campaign for Mothers Against Drunk Driving from TBWA\Toronto and Holiday Films director Adam Massey. See four spots here. The cheap-jack Stayin' on the Road talk-show setup feels forced. The guests' "tips" on how to successfully drive drunk—taking underused back roads and always driving in a straight line no matter what—are, of course, ludicrous. But the bland presentation doesn't make them sound nearly dangerous enough, and they almost seem like serious suggestions. Now, if the guests had been realistic and unsettlingly rendered corpses explaining their strategies—OMG, then we'd have PSAs to reckon with! Still, Iggy Pop should watch these …
'Twilight' star shows off scaly SoBe skinsuit
Retrieved 236 Days Ago
(By "Adweek Blogs") Supposedly it took 12 hours for a makeup artist to paint a scaly skinsuit on Twilight star Ashley Greene to shoot some ads for SoBe Lifewater, which has a bit of a lizard theme going. See a bunch more photos here. This begs the question of why they didn't just go with a bikini. Is body paint measurably sexier? Does it sell that much more Lifewater? Twelve hours of having a stranger's hands all over you in a non-sexual way can't be that fun. Not only that, but it says to us the company cares more about showing off than about making an effective pitch. However, she isn't sparkling in direct sunlight, so this is still more dignified than her other recent work.—Posted by David Kiefaber
Movie night's explosive at Pop Secret house
Retrieved 236 Days Ago
(By "Adweek Blogs")
Goodby, Silverstein & Partners has put together some animated spots for Pop Secret which, in the best tradition of suicide food, show kernels of corn acting out their favorite movies scenes—the art form during which they are most commonly devoured. The first two ads feature readings of The Dark Knight (above) and Caddyshack (below). In each spot, one kernel gets overly excited and explodes. That will surely happen again in the third spot—which they're apparently holding for the Super Bowl—in which a pair of kernels will re-enact a certain popular scene from When Harry Met Sally. —Posted by Tim Nudd
Philip K. Dick estate paranoid about Google
Retrieved 236 Days Ago
(By "Adweek Blogs") In what would be a milestone for any evil, monopolistic corporation, Google has earned the official disapproval of Philip K. Dick—or at least, the estate of the long-dead sci-fi author. The point of contention: Google's new Nexus One smartphone, whose name, says the Dick estate, was stolen from the Nexus-6 cyborgs of Dick's 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, on which the classic '80s film Blade Runner was based. Google denies this. Hmmm … what are they trying to hide? If this were one of the author's mind-bending tales, layers of false reality would be stripped away to reveal that the Nexus One is really just an iPhone inside, and that Google's market-dominating search capabilities have been powered by Yahoo! all along. Alas, this is the real world, and that won't happen. …
Zendough rescues you from financial horror
Retrieved 236 Days Ago
(By "Adweek Blogs") Faceless freaks in top hats "walk among us" and magically steal our faces in Cramer-Krasselt's introductory spot (posted below) for personal money-management site Zendough.com. Roughly halfway through this 60-second ad, a young woman's face goes flying. It's not graphic, and it's obviously a metaphor for identity theft, but ... it's her freaking face, and it appears to be screaming in agony! There are also hovering Stormtrooper-type heads spying on mankind and a dragon symbolizing interest rates that destroys a house. All of the strange goings-on—enough odd imagery to fill half a dozen freaky ads—makes the protagonist consider getting his finances in order. (He might not be the brightest penny in the piggy bank.) The service is supposed to help consumers achieve a Zen-like state with …
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