W+K, Sofia Coppola Craft Holiday Efforts for Gap

Sofia Coppola (The Virgin Suicides, Lost in Translation) is the latest marquee Hollywood director enlisted for Wieden+Kennedy’s “Dress Normal” campaign for Gap, following David Fincher‘s efforts in August and taking the reigns of four holiday  spots — a pair each for broadcast and online.

The ads spin the “Dress Normal” tagline by showing some abnormal (and often cringe-inducing) family holiday moments. But then what’s more normal than pondering the family you’ll never understand? Each spot ends with the message “You don’t have to get them to give them Gap” preceding the tagline. It’s an interesting approach, positioning Gap as a gift for those family members you have no idea what to give to, but it sits well with the “Dress Normal” tagline and Coppola and company do a good job of making it work in most of the ads.

In perhaps the most successful of the spots, “Gauntlet” a girl returns home to her large, boisterous, and often odd family. Perfectly set to the Johnny Cash song “I Got Stripes,” she makes her way through the house greeting her relatives with an awkward expression on her face that says a lot about the effort she’s putting in to deal with these people. It feels like a telling glance into the lives of a particular family, which is the approach taken throughout these efforts and, along with some great song selections, what makes them charming. The other broadcast spot, “Mistletoe,” documents a particularly cringe-worthy moment under the mistletoe at a holiday party. It’s almost hard to watch, but then that makes it fit the “You don’t have to get them to give them Gap” all the more.

In addition to the two online ads — “Crooner” and “Pinball” — the campaign is supported by print and OOH elements, as well as digital banner ads launching on Gap’s social media channels and GapGiftGuide.com on November 3rd. (more…)

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David Fincher Spots Expand on New W+K Gap Campaign

The hottest story in the ad world today concerns the newly-released TV components of a campaign that had a few scratching their heads last week: W+K’s “Dress Normal” for new client Gap.

These ads, directed by David Fincher, add a bit of narrative heft to a campaign previously consisting of celebrities in everyday poses. The first one, “Golf”, elaborates on the “it’s OK if your clothes are a little boring” theme with a bit of spontaneously unconventional romance:

Three more and credits below.

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David Fincher Directs Rooney Mara in Calvin Klein Fragrance Ad

David Fincher's Calvin Klein commercial starring Rooney Mara exists in a dreary, dreamless dimension beyond banality and cliché. It occupies a zone so soullessly stylized that "style" loses all meaning … a wasteland so unironic that irony screams for release, only to go unheard. This 60-second black-and-white spot introducing CK's Downtown fragrance plays like an unfunny parody of its putrid genre—yet it's very real, which makes irony scream all the more. In other words, it's like every other pretentious, faux-artsy perfume and fashion commercial. Maybe more so. Fincher previously directed Mara in The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and The Social Network. "Runaway" by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs plays on the soundtrack. The ad features puppies, buses, rain, subways, earbuds and a press conference. A lot of stuff happens in slow motion. Mara cracks a smile, which The Huffington Post seems to think is a big deal. I'm not sold on the name of the perfume, either. How does downtown usually smell? In my experience, it stinks. Print ad below the video.