For years, the question “What do you do when your local hostelry has run out of beer as a result of a landslide blocking the delivery train?” has plagued beer drinkers throughout the Rocky Mountains.
Thankfully, Chemistry can now reveal the answer…
“Moving”, our latest Coors Light TV ad, is an action-packed adventure set in the Rockies, about three likeable lads who mastermind a plan to bring the mountain to the Mohammed. And, without giving too much away, let’s just say their solution is pretty unique.
With its cast of memorable characters, wry observations and convincing Rocky Mountain atmospherics, “Moving” steams along over a scintillating soundtrack from Liverpool’s enigmatic post-punk combo, Clinic. (Anyone who sees the ad more than once may well want the name of this infernally catchy tune, so here it is: “IPC Sub-Editors Dictate Our Youth”. Go get it on iTunes, fan boys.)
You might think it would cost a fortune to shoot an ad like this in the Rockies. Well, yes. But we didn’t shoot it there. Instead we journeyed to deepest, barrenest, remotest Manchester – Salford, to be precise! The director was Damien O’Donnell (he of the features “East is East”, “Heartlands”, “Inside I’m Dancing”) and the producer was Russ Russell of Russell Curran Productions. Post-production was by Screen Scene with sound mixed by The Slate.
A short while ago, we posted this piece of advertising lunacy from Japan. Well here’s another, which takes that old technique of drawing faces on people’s chins and takes it up a notch or two. Once again, we haven’t a clue what it’s advertising. But it’s a fantastic piece of visual creativity which, like the previous ad, encapsulates the essential paradox of Japan: for a country that culturally, is often typified by its grace, manners, etiquette and conservatism, it manages to be simultaneously a hotbed of outrageous creative anarchy. Are the the two related? Maybe it’s like the Victorian era in the UK, where beneath the ultra-repressed conformist society lurked a hedonistic underbelly where prostitution and drug abuse were rife. Or maybe they’re just nuts.
We had some fantastic news this week. BMW Ireland and MINI Ireland confirmed that they’ve appointed Chemistry as their integrated agency. At this point it’s tempting to apply lots of car-related puns such as how we’re planning on taking things up a gear. Or that we’re firing on all cylinders and are revved up to go. But that would be tiresome and clichéd. Suffice to say then that we’ll be going flat-out to dazzle our new client with some turbo-charged advertising.
Check out our brand new TV ad for eircom. It’s called “Frozen” and it tells the tale of a man whose girlfriend – as he says to everyone’s favourite eircom support guy, Jim –”keeps freezing on me”. Of course, at the mere mention of freezing, Jim’s excitable imagination kicks into overdrive and he pictures the hapless lady in a range of situations in which she’s as stiff as a board, and considerably colder. Later, it turns out the caller meant something else entirely – but to find out what, you’ll have to watch it…
"Frozen" was produced by Red Rage and directed by Bryan O'Malley in glorious Technicolor (- no, not really – we did that in the grade). The agency producer was Fiona McGarry.
As video games have developed the same global financial muscle as films, so the advertising for these games has become increasingly sophisticated. Agencies that specialised in console game advertising used to struggle to attract creative talent. But that was then, when game trailers would consist solely of a few shots of the action edited together. Now that games can arouse the same kind of pre-release excitement as a film, we’ve seen a massive improvement in how that excitement is generated visually. And there’s a key difference which perhaps makes it easier for the game industry: you don’t need to explain the plot to the same degree as you do a film. So you don’t need the ubiquitous gravelly voiced orator telling you that ‘when Jack Actor’s family are killed, he’ll stop at nothing to get revenge.’ Instead, particularly when the release is part of a series (Halo, Gears of War, Call of Duty, Bioshock etc), the audience already know the premise, which usually involves the mass slaughter of aliens, humans or robots with a succession of weaponry. All that remains then is to whet the appetite. Here are some classic and current examples.
The ultimate game ad – Halo 3 (which became the fastest selling video game ever)
