If you don’t know, you’d better read on. You may well be looking for ideas in all the wrong places.
Curious and Clemenger BBDO New Zealand are having a dream run on the awards circuit with Blazed. Why would an ad, built around three kids talking in a dialect that’s difficult to understand, woo and win ad jurors from every corner of the world? Well, if you want to spoil this story’s ending, feel free to read the bottom first.
Or enjoy the story. (Yes, this is a clue)
Ben Coulson was one of the judges who gave Blazed a vote of approval. He was on the executive jury for the New York Festivals World’s Best Advertising. “Australian and New Zealand work made the room light up. It has a sense of humour and a lightness of touch.” But that was not the only reason Blazed stood above the others.
“It’s relatively easy getting onto the finalist lists. After that, the going gets tough. The work has to have an extra factor not seen before. It has to be judged as ‘the new way of doing this’,” Coulson added. Blazed is. But there’s more.
Coulson and Grasse have both picked up on something the industry will probably ‘embrace’ eventually. It’s just not there yet.
Simple Plan (MTV Exit) directed by Ash Bolland
Smirnoff, directed by Darryl Ward
Parrot Dog, directed by Sam Kristofski
“I don’t get why everyone is still looking for some magical piece of new, now, wow technology to tack onto their idea as if that’s the essential element. Why is everyone still spinning in an ‘orb of confusion’ (that’s Grasse’s Spongebob reference. He has little kids) about digital? Why are we still obsessing about, ‘What is this digital revolution?’ ‘How do I use it?’ ‘Where do I use it?’…. ‘Are we there yet?’. Ads are not toys. They have work to do. What makes good work always goes back to simple truths. And the first two truths are 1. If the idea is shit, the ad is, and 2. If the idea is not front and centre, it won’t be seen or heard. You can send a shit message anywhere you want (and these days, pretty much everywhere), it’s still not going to be looked at.
Grasse is not out on a spindly limb here. He’s just forward thinking. So is New York Times Business Day columnist, David Segal. Here are some facts from The Great Unwatched http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/04/business/the-great-unwatched.html?_r=0, published a week ago: “Vindico, an ad management platform company, deemed 57 percent of two billion video ads surveyed over two months to be ‘unviewable’…Given the nearly $3 billion a year now spent on online video ads, and the 57 percent of them that are deemed unviewable, it’s safe to assume that American brands are now spending more than $1 billion a year on marketing that few if any people see.”
Apparently, ‘engaging customers where they are,’ isn’t exactly what’s happening.
“We’re starting to believe our own bullshit,” Grasse concludes. [In fact, adland has been believing its own bullshit for decades, but that’s another topic:ed]
“And we’ve done it – blurring the lines. I don’t want to blue the lines. I want to do what we do very, very well.”
And Curious is doing it very well apparently. Why is not curious at all. It’s logical. “We stayed true,” Grasse states. “Curious has always been about good direction, good filmmaking and good storytelling. Good commercials are made of that too. People just want to be told a good story. They’ll pay attention to that and they don’t mind hearing it over and over again. We didn’t split our brand into slivers so that we could wear the right labels. We’re a production company. We make big films and little films.
“You call our little films ads. We treat them both the same way. When you practise making a lot of big and little films, you get good at it. Of course, we use new technology. It’s just that we use it to enhance the story – in special effects, motion graphics, animation…If it doesn’t further the message, it’s outside our interest. Why do you think all those busy people out there are chomping at the bit to spend more time and effort on some experience or interaction with a brand?”
Blazed was probably watched on iPhones and iPads. It was probably shared on social media. It ran on TV and it ran in cinema. None of that has anything to do with why it’s gathering awards.
Blazed for NZTA, directed by Taika Waititi
These have everything to do with it:
It stands out and stands alone. And that has so very much to do with Curious’ and director Taika Waititi’s input.
It has a gig idea and that big ideas is front and centre: To your kids, you look stupid when you’re stoned.
Its message cannot be ignored or argued away. How you are seen by your own children hits you right in the heart. Nothing will deflect it.
Undiluted authenticity. And while that cliché is whittling your brain back into fadland, know that every piece of dialogue was scripted. One billion kudos points to the director.
Not complicated. Not messy. Not tricked up. Not asking too much of its audience. It presents an awkward truth that you take on board without resistance and want to do change because it’s handed to you with a light hand and a bit of grin.
