Hasta La Creative!

An ’80s film cliche gets new life in this year’s Super Bowl spot from online auto retailer CarMax, created out of Silver & Partners, directed by Harold Einstein and released today, 11 days before the game.

The ad begins with a satisfied customer telling a CarMax agent how grateful he is for having started his auto search at the retailer. The agent responds by whipping out his hands and clapping — very, very slowly. Others around the neighborhood follow suit, from the quarterback and the cheerleader to the mailman to the pie-eating-contest contestants. It’s the sort of montage that you seen in those uplifting athletic underdog films from the ’80s like “Rudy.” And as it turns out, Sean Astin, who played “Rudy,” makes a clapping cameo in the spot as well.

But that’s not all for CarMax. Picking up on another cliche, this time around Super Bowl advertising itself, the advertiser created an online component by reenacting the entire ad with dogs. The puppy version was directed by Ronnie Koff at Imaginary Forces.

Continue reading at AdAge.com