James Lipton's beard protecting teens' junk
LG and Young & Rubicam have enlisted James Lipton, and his great and powerful beard, for some amusing PSAs urging young texters to "give it a ponder" before spreading hurtful gossip and/or pics of their junk across the interwebs. The Inside the Actors Studio host literally lends his beard to each troubled youngster to get them to do the right thing. One spot is posted below. See all four here, along with four print ads. They're all hair-larious. It's just really fun to hear Lipton say things like, "The last thing he needs is tweets about his beets." Over at the Web site, JL's talking beard will guide you through the standard social-media components. Will these ads break through to jaded teens? My husband happens to have a whole class of 9th graders who saw the ads during homeroom. What did they say? "Why does she have a beard? I don't get it. That's retarded." But you have to know how to read a 9th grader. Apparently, they hate everything. The important thing is: They didn't say it was gay. —Posted by Rebecca Cullers
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Published on December 2, 2009 | Permalink
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Boost Mobile has Mrs. Claus on naughty list
Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus star in separate Christmas-themed Boost Mobile ads from agency 180, part of the long-running "Unwrong'd" campaign. When it comes to wrongness, Mrs. Claus is way ahead of her husband, engaging in some icy-hot lovemaking with a snowman in the stop-motion animated spot above. (Her friend can handle the heat of passion but not the hairdryer that's turned on him when the big man returns unexpectedly.) Santa, meanwhile, burdened by large cell-phone bills, has been forced to make some cutbacks in the spot below, and has replaced his reindeer with mules. Which seems like a minor sin by comparison, and he doesn't seem amorous toward any of his new hires, either. —Posted by Tim Nudd See also: |
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Published on December 1, 2009 | Permalink
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Vodafone ads show sad face of text bullying
It's not such a g'day Down Under when text-messaging bullies go all Qwerty on your ass. That's the basic thrust of this Colenso BBDO print campaign for Vodafone in Australia and New Zealand. The work effectively (if somewhat derivatively) plasters frowny-sad emoticons on the faces of school-age victims. Of course, if they actually look like that—bright yellow disk-shaped heads with no ears or noses—then they do have something to cry about and they will get teased. But seriously, this is a legitimate mobile-age problem that's generated its share of tragedies, so kudos to client and agency for confronting the issue, um, head-on. Via Ads of the World. —Posted by David Gianatasio |
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Published on November 20, 2009 | Permalink
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Never stop talking again, with Virgin Mobile!
Virgin Mobile's new ad campaign takes garrulousness to a new level. The commercial posted below shows a woman yammering into her phone while in a gym locker room. As she heads off to the shower, she leaves her mouth behind with the phone, where it keeps chattering away, as another woman has to listen to the indiscrete conversation about the first woman's disgusting medical condition. Two more ads show women in a store and poolside. The effect is less creepy, more reminiscent of bad Photoshop. Maybe that's what BBH New York is going for with the "Never Stop Talking" push, which promotes a $49.99 unlimited calling plan. There's also the obligatory social-media element, a Facebook contest launching next week to find "the sexiest mouth in America." —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
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Published on November 18, 2009 | Permalink
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Fred Willard gets in holiday spirit with Alltel
Fred Willard and the nerdy Alltel sales guys in a rhyming holiday spot? You're not tripping on eggnog—it's true! Fred amiably narrates the proceedings in the ad below, reclaiming some of the dignity he lost by appearing in those FedEx mock-infomercials. Much of the Alltel action takes place on a stage—an attempt, perhaps, to evoke an aura of festive yuletide pageants. Or maybe it just saved Campbell-Ewald some bucks on location filming. Do I detect some heat between Chad and Heather at the store? Oh yeah, they'll hook up—thanks to the free LG Touch with a one-year contact. The nerds, as always, are left standing out in the cold. —Posted by David Gianatasio
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Published on November 17, 2009 | Permalink
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Droid phone will enthrall and/or enslave you
Mix the totalitarian subjugation of 1984 with the sinister cybernetic intelligence of 2001, and you get mcgarrybowen's launch spot (posted below) for Verizon's much-ballyhooed Droid phone. (I swear that's HAL 9000's all-seeing red eye about 22 seconds in.) It picks up the dark and industrial vibe from the tail end of the otherwise goofy and lighthearted teaser spot, which got lots of attention, particularly from Apple fans. The new spot stars intimidating robots who crush rocks and punch holes to assert their metallic superiority. And unless I've missed the point (unlikely, as I never have on AdFreak before, at least not that I'd admit), humans will do these droids' bidding once Earth is enslaved, toiling in factories and slugging it out in bloody boxing matches for their overlords' amusement. This isn't a smartphone, the ad warns, it's a robotphone. You don't talk to the boss on a Droid, the phone is your boss. Droid doesn't relay orders, it gives them. On the plus side, Justin Long will be among the first to go in the man-vs.-machine struggle. John Hodgman, a robot passing as flesh and blood, will probably get to run Cleveland. —Posted by David Gianatasio Previously on AdFreak: |
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Published on November 9, 2009 | Permalink
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Creators of anti-Droid ad unmasked (sort of)
It turns out pros are behind the Apple-fanboy spoof ad (above) of the Verizon Droid ad spoofing Apple ads. The Wall Street Journal's Digits blog has an interview with the creators, described as staffers from a "Boston-area ad agency." The creative director, "Shawn" (they declined to give their last names), doesn't go out of his way to refute the notion that creative directors can sometimes act like jerks. He says the most controversial line in the spot, "iDon't buy brands who bash other brands," is pointed out as being hypocritical within the ad itself (by showing a Mac and PC clip and the line, "i… oops"). "Apparently even in fake advertising, you can go wrong estimating the intelligence of your audience," Shawn says. Ouch. The question remains: Which Boston-area ad agency is it? —Posted by Brian Morrissey Previously on AdFreak: |
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Published on October 29, 2009 | Permalink
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Vodafone recommends stalking Eva Mendes
The nerdy narrative thrust of this 60-second Vodafone spot from Argentina by ad agency Santo is impressive, as is the payoff, which rings so true. What would any of us say to celebrities if we got them on the phone? I'd tell Derek Jeter he's a god (go Yanks!) and advise Bono to lose the sunglasses and accent (it's an obvious fake). I'd warn Jay, Dave and Conan to stop stealing my best AdFreak material and hit them up for jobs. As for Eva Mendes, well, I'd congratulate her on her most recent film, praise her performance, tell her she's the hottest actress around and close with, "It was a pleasure speaking to you, Ms. Longoria." Via Ads of the World. Previously on AdFreak: |
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Published on October 29, 2009 | Permalink
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Apple fan strikes back at Verizon Droid spot
It was inevitable. The Verizon Droid spoof of an Apple commercial (below) has now been spoofed by an Apple fanboy in the video above. It just changes the copy with jabs about ripping off Apple and the interesting claim that "iDon't buy from brands that bash other brands." This makes my head hurt. We can only hope a Droid supporter doesn't spoof the spoof of the spoof. A hole might open in the universe. Via the WSJ's Digits blog. —Posted by Brian Morrissey |
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Published on October 27, 2009 | Permalink
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Deutsche Telekom gives tiny folks big ideas
This visually neat Deutsche Telekom spot from Germany uses time-lapse tilt-shift photography, which makes the people in it look insignificant, harried and vulnerable—like little action figures waiting to be crushed. I kept expecting a giant boot to come down and flatten the wee folks. Of course, agency Philipp & Keuntje in Hamburg intended the opposite: It's all about empowerment and how "big changes start small," like people handing in their old cell phones and getting paperless bills to "conserve valuable resources" and "help preserve nature." I would do whatever the ad suggests, or else … stomp, stomp, stomp! In the meantime, the Deutsche Telekom ogres are killing us slowly with that cloying background music, "Neopolitan Dreams," by Lisa Mitchell. Via Adland. |
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Published on October 6, 2009 | Permalink
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LG's 'gorgeous slab' helps humanity evolve
It's a little strange to see a 40-year-old movie reference in an ad for a swank new phone, but LG makes it work in this British spot for the Chocolate BL40. The monolith is an appropriate image for a phone billed by its manufacturer as "the world's first wide-screen mobile" and by Engadget as "LG's gorgeous mile-long slab." There's no doubt it's a sexy phone, what with its 21:9 aspect ratio. But the thing's more than five inches long, practically the size of a candy bar. That could make for some awkward conversations: "Is that a monolith in your pocket, or are you just happy to have achieved sentience?" —Posted by David Griner Previously on AdFreak: |
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Published on September 30, 2009 | Permalink
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For safe text, wrap your phone in a condom
This phone is wearing a condom to encourage teens to practice "safe text," which involves resisting the urge to send nude cell-phone pics of oneself all over creation. The work is by Serve Marketing and the United Way of Milwaukee, who previously teamed up on the memorable (non-)scratch-and-sniff diaper bus-shelter ad, warning teens about the olfactory downsides of parenthood. Milwaukee used to be famous for producing second-rate beer. Now, it's known for rampant teen pregnancy. Maybe there's a connection. Verizon and the Ad Council also have a campaign that warns against "sexting" and other forms of risky digital dating behavior. Obviously, sharing nude pictures of yourself is a bad idea, especially if you don't exercise regularly. Still, what else do you do for fun if you're stranded in Milwaukee on a Saturday night? —Posted by David Gianatasio |
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Published on September 28, 2009 | Permalink
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Tiny cars cut to the chase for LG cell phone
This charming ad from Y&R New York might be one of the better car commercials of the year. But it's not a car commercial. The tiny vehicles race around in service of the LG enVTouch smartphone. The best detail: when the white foam packaging puffs go flying in the alley. If some of the sequences seem familiar, like you'd screened them somewhere before, that's part of the build-up to the cinematic punch line. The phone becomes a drive-in movie in the final scene, OK? Sorry to spoil the surprise (which is pretty minimal), but given the themes here, it made sense to cut to the chase. Via Ads of the World. See also: |
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Published on September 18, 2009 | Permalink
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Cell-phone service the cheapskates will loveA Down-Under version of Jack Black with Andy Rooney eyebrows stars in Whybin\TBWA's "It's alright to be tight" campaign for Comtel Just Prepaid cell-phone service. "Tight" can sometimes mean drunk, and these ads are Australian, so it is kind of a surprise that everyone stays sober. "Tight" here means miserly. In the spot above, our shaggy, cheapskate hero seeks the cheapest arrangement for a relative's funeral. ("How much for just the hole?") In one of the spots below, he comes across flowers on a roadside pole and deadpans that he's found a gift for his mum's birthday. The actor's spot-on portrayal is repugnant and appealing at the same time: We'd never want to be associated with such a crass doofus, but we all sometimes wish we could behave like he does and get away with it. Via Adland. |
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Published on September 8, 2009 | Permalink
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Shadow-puppet bunnies prefer U.S. Cellular
What leaps to mind when you see huge shadow-puppet bunnies? U.S. Cellular, of course! Publicis & Hal Riney joined with Anonymous Content and The Mill to create this new spot, which is visually arresting, though its creepy music and moody photography suggest a childhood nightmare. It sort of plays like a Japanese monster bash sans the city-stomping destruction (which, of course, is the best part of such movies). Here, the crowd uses U.S. Cellular to share images of smooching rabbits. Big deal! A second spot, currently in post-production, is shaping up as a surrealistic tour de force—in addition to a giant inflatable octopus, it includes torpedo-style "flying fish" and all manner of outsized marine life tooling around town. Maybe the tentacled terror, the deep-sea dynamos and the mammoth marsupials will fight to the death. I'd bet on the octopus. The few times I've tried it, it was pretty tough. —Posted by David Gianatasio See also: |
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Published on August 18, 2009 | Permalink
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Nail-gunned Boost Mobile guy gets off easy
The guy in Inspire's latest Hispanic spot for Boost Mobile doesn't flinch as nails get shot into his back and neck. This is understandable. Sure, he's been abused by rival carriers and can take a lot of pain—that's the theme of the campaign. But also, he's probably knows it could be worse. Based on Boost's recent ads, he could've landed on a slab in the morgue; been mauled by dogs; grown floppy man-boobs; had lunch with a talking hog bent on devouring his porky pals; or tooled around on a bike with some chick's impossibly long, flowing underarm hair tickling his face. What's a few nails in the back? A few dabs of iodine, and he's as good as new. See also: |
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Published on August 12, 2009 | Permalink
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Ozzy phones it in again in new Samsung ad
Ozzy Osbourne. A chimpanzee. Which one never evolved? That question popped into my head as I watched the chimp invite the corpselike Ozzy to join his band in this commercial for Samsung's Solstice phone. If you thought Leo Burnett's earlier Samsung spots with Ozzy were soul-crushing, check out this iteration. Does Ozzy mumble incoherently? Are his "expletives" bleeped out? Do he and the chimp make goofy faces? Lord have mercy, it's all in there! Come to think of it, since every word Ozzy says is impossible to understand, his profanity would also be incomprehensible. Why bleep him at all? Eons ago, when Ozzy was a heavy-metal god, some folks worried that his music would rot people's brains. His music won't, but this campaign will! And hey, wasn't there a movement to ban the use of great apes in commercials? Can we add Ozzy to the list of creatures that should never be used in ads again? |
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Published on August 6, 2009 | Permalink
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Horndogs hit on Zeta-Jones in T-Mobile ads
I know I shouldn't encourage the "Husbands are ugly imbeciles" ad cliché, but I laugh at the T-Mobile spot above every time I hear the guy tell Catherine Zeta-Jones, "I like it when you say things." The ad, by Publicis in Seattle, is part of a new strategy by the carrier of basically just showing horny guys drooling all over the actress. In the spot below, it's a geeky teen who puts the moves on her. It's not the most chivalrous way to welcome the woman back after her three-year hiatus from T-Mobile advertising. Then again, she can probably handle any creepy conversation, considering she married a codger whose pickup line was, "I'd like to father your children."
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Published on August 5, 2009 | Permalink
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Call the Palm Pre Girl crazy at your own risk
Life is obviously quite difficult for the woman in Modernista!'s new Palm Pre commercials. As she explains in her (unofficial) Twitter feed, she's trapped on a rock and worshipped daily by a dancing orange cult. And in her newest commercial, above, she admits that when she does venture out in public, people seem to think she's crazy. Let's see if they're so brazen in their mockery when her kung-fu army shows up to spirit her back to the land of surreal beauty and plain garments. |
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Published on July 29, 2009 | Permalink
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Bas Rutten fights cell-phone plans for Net10
Droga5 and Epoch Films cast mixed-martial-arts badass Bas Rutten in this "Cell Defense" campaign for pre-paid cell-phone company Net10.com. He demonstrates various ways to fight back (physically) against your existing cell-phone plan. (See another video here.) "Cell Defense" ... hilarious! I bet it took two copywriters to think up that one. That said, there is something absurdly amusing about Rutten, who looks like Moby on steroids, repeatedly bellowing "Cancel your face!" as he mock-punches his sparring pal. I guess resorting to violence is OK if your mobile provider won't let you prematurely terminate the plan that you willingly signed up for. That's the American way. The funniest part of the clip is the "Don't try this at home" warning. Yeah, I'm sure kids would never dream of it. —Posted by David Gianatasio |
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Published on July 13, 2009 | Permalink
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Nokia video recreates classic album covers
This Nokia video by London-based enterThe7thChamber is impossible not to like. It portrays a stupid but amusing conversation between classic album covers via the speaking-in-song-titles routine popularized a few years back on Whose Line Is It Anyway. Blondie and Mariah Carey are disturbingly masculine; Ringo's in character as the lovable scene-stealer (I'm not so sure that isn't the real Mr. Starkey, in fact); the Rolling Stones crotch shot is good stuffing—er, good stuff; and Jim Morrison, fittingly enough, appears at "The End." It's designed to drive traffic to a "Playlist" competition promoting the Nokia 5800 ExpressMusic Phone. This ad makes me feel so old. Are any of these acts still popular anywhere other than Rock Band or Guitar Hero? Sigh. I'm reeling in the years. |
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Published on June 25, 2009 | Permalink
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Modernista! choreographs grand Palm spot
Here's the first spot from Boston's Modernista! for the new Palm Pre phone. According to USA Today, the ad "features 1,000 dancers directed by three choreographers, including Sun Yupeng, who helped create the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony." The commercial, which takes places in an expansive field, shows the dancers forming circles around actress Tamara Hope, who sits on a rock and operates the new phone. The voiceover says something about bringing everyone closer together. It was probably a good idea for the agency to try some Chinese imagery now that its showpiece client, GM's Hummer, is being acquired by a Chinese company. Still, this ad looks like it was extremely expensive to create. You could probably whip up something pretty similar with a graphics program on an iPhone. Don't they have an app for that? |
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Published on June 5, 2009 | Permalink
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Danica signs man boobs in Boost Mobile ad
Danica Patrick has joined 180LA's "Unwrong'd" campaign for Boost Mobile, following in the proud hoofsteps of those cannibalistic pigs from a few months ago. The setup is the same as the earlier spots: The viewer is subjected to some unpleasant visuals—in this case, Patrick signing man boobs and being tended to by a pit team in drag—and is then told that's not as "wrong" as getting screwed over by your mobile carrier. Go Daddy's Bob Parsons is going to be livid when he finds out that Danica signed any kind of boobs in someone else's ad. UPDATE: Also check out the third video below for a peek behind the scenes of the spots. It includes some choice quotes from 180LA's William Gelner, who says that channeling the insanity of his creative team into a Boost ad is like herding cats. |
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Published on May 27, 2009 | Permalink
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Protect the crayon people with U.S. Cellular
This ad from Publicis & Hal Riney for U.S. Cellular is, without a doubt, the greatest reverse-melting crayon ad ever made. It's hypnotic, creepy, trippy and ever so vaguely sexual, with perfect portions of each quality skillfully mixed to keep the brand message from being overwhelmed. The clip provides a memorable visual metaphor to illustrate the point that with U.S. Cellular, users' data is never lost for good. To see the same basic idea handled much differently, watch this ham-fisted (actually, cow-fisted!) Draftfcb commercial for Qwest. Psychedelic crayons vs. hands-in-a-heifer! When it comes to data protection, I think the choice is clear. |
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Published on May 7, 2009 | Permalink
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T-Mobile turns London into big karaoke bar
T-Mobile is getting good at these big public advertising stunts over in London. First, they organized the spontaneous dancing in Liverpool Street Station (below). Then, last Thursday, they managed to get 13,000 people into Trafalgar Square for what they thought might be another dance-a-thon, but which turned out to be a collective karaoke rendition of "Hey Jude" (above). The American singer Pink showed up and joined in, too, for some reason. These flash-mob stunts, coordinated by Saatchi & Saatchi, are less notable for how they reinforce T-Mobile's brand message, which is the typically vague "Life's for sharing," than for the brand-specific way in which they're mobilized: via text message to T-Mobile customers. |
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Published on May 4, 2009 | Permalink
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