Hasta La Creative!

Here is a really beautifully filmed commercial from France featuring a boy named George who has remarkable powers. It would spoil the ending a bit to tell you the advertiser, so just watch as George shows off his amazing abilities.

The ad, made in English and French versions, was done by agency Les Gaulois and directed by Jeppe Ronde. Via Ads of the World.

CREDITS
Client: Acadomia
Agency: Les Gaulois, France
Creative Directors: Marco Venturelli, Luca Cinquepalmi
Art Director: Mickael Jeanne
Copywriter: Alexandre Drouillard
Director: Jeppe Ronde

Plenty of agencies describe themselves as full service, but one really wants to take that commitment to the next level.

At least, that’s the premise of a video Geometry Global Paris made as an uncomfortably literal love note to marketers, celebrating the New Year. In the clip, staffers at the agency are informed that, in 2015, they’ll be required to pucker up and French kiss their clients—because what better way to show the agency’s French-ness and devotion to its work?

Naturally, the whole thing is all a joke, but the reactions are pretty excellent. Some employees register, as you might expect, bewilderment. Others blurt out the sort of desperation for intimacy that can only come from marathon late nights in the office working on mind-numbing campaigns. Others still get indignant, which might be most surprising, given agency staffers are basically paid to debase themselves for clients on a regular basis.

The smartest guy by far starts bargaining for a bonus. At least he understands the terms.

Via Design Taxi.

When the mood is right but you’re all out of condoms, most amorous adventurers would simply run to the 24-hour pharmacy. But in France, the back-up plan seems to be a tad more mundane.

In a series of new anti-AIDS ads from TBWA Paris, the participants in a would-be threeway end up interlocking jigsaw puzzle pieces rather than limbs, and several couples find equally bland ways to spend their naked time together. 

“No condom, no sex,” is the tagline for these spots for AIDES, the advocacy group behind a wide range of enjoyable videos.

While the premise is rather silly, it’s a charming way to tackle a decades-old message that usually feels like a high school lecture. And hey, a naked puzzle party doesn’t sound all that bad. 

Via Osocio.

Psst, maybe we shouldn’t take this apartment—the floor seems kind of slanted.

Ikea promoted the opening of its 30th store in France by building an apartment into a vertical rock-climbing wall. Marketing shop Ubi Bene helped devise the impressive outdoor installation in the city of Clermont-Ferrand.

The wall is 9 meters high by 10 meters wide and fitted with steps and grips, allowing the public to navigate among stylish beds, cabinets, tables, chairs, sofas and accessories. (Using harnesses and with safety personnel on hand, naturally.)

The Swedish retailer’s been in fine creative form with its marketing lately. Other notable efforts include lighting a forest with LED lamps to celebrate energy efficient bulbs, pitching its 2015 catalog as “cutting-edge technology” and teaming with Airbnb to give folks a chance to spend a night in one of its stores.

Even if you can’t make it to central France, you can still enjoy a similar Ikea experience at home, because trying to put that furniture together will drive you up the wall.

Via Design Taxi, with images from Ubi Bene on Facebook.

I’m roaring with approval for this interactive sequel, of sorts, to “The Bear,” the 2012 Grand Prix-winning commercial from BETC Paris and French movie channel Canal+.

In the original, an ursine auteur sinks his claws into a big-budget medieval action film, fussing like a temperamental Hollywood diva over every aspect of production, from the script and direction to the special effects and score. Ultimately, the spot pulls the rug out from under viewers’ expectations with an inspired visual punch line.

Now, with “Being the Bear,” users can play director and take over a film set, choosing among several genre types to complete a dramatic scene (shown in the first commercial) in which a woman kneels over a wounded warrior who has been shot through the chest with an arrow. Naturally, some of the selections work better than others, but the writing and on-screen details are sharp throughout, and they reward multiple viewings. (The approach reminds me a bit of Tipp-Ex’s pick-your-own-adventure videos—work from France that featured a goofy, scenery-chewing bear. It also recalls the “Film, TV and Theater Styles” game from Whose Line Is It Anyway?)

My favorites in the new Canal+ campaign include the “Porno” option, which lets the actors have a ball, and “Horror,” a gloriously yucky exercise in spit-screen technique. The “Independent” selection yields the kind of self-obsessed, overly-probing dialogue only an audience of film majors (or Woody Allen) could love.

I wish they’d included a “Wildlife Documentary” option, because it might’ve given the bear—who stays behind the camera this time (we just glimpse his paw)—a role he could really sink his teeth into.

See the original spot below.

Via Adland.

Last summer, TBWA Paris unveiled a bold campaign for McDonald's that consisted entirely of classic menu items photographed up close—with no branding at all. (Did somebody say McDonald's? Not in those ads.)

Now, agency and client are back with a follow-up campaign that, in a way, is even more minimalist. Instead of the actual products, now we get clean, simple drawings of the products—turning them into actual icons. There is a bit more explicit branding on these, though, but it's still very subtle—a tiny Golden Arches next to the illustrations.

The ads feature McDonald's "Big 6" menu items—Big Mac, cheeseburger, fries, sundae, Chicken Nuggets and Filet-o-Fish—and will appear on more than 2,700 outdoor displays in France, with the major rollout beginning June 2. The agency calls the work "unique and modern, in the McDonald's brand image," "exclusive, simple and universal, just like the six iconic products" and "a fun and intriguing addition to our cities."

More images, plus a new McDonald's TV spot from TBWA Paris, below.

This Canal+ campaign, which uses the French TV channel's trademark "+" symbol as a visual cue in a series of reimagined movie posters, sure has lots of positives.

The work was created by BETC Paris to celebrate the 67th Cannes Film Festival (which runs May 14-25) and will appear as outdoor and print advertising during the event. Nine movies screening on Canal+ are featured, including Despicable Me 2, Fast & Furious 6, Star Trek Into Darkness and Man of Steel. The "+"s on these particular posters work extremely well, replacing, respectively, a Minion, tire tracks, stars in outer space and the stylized "S" on Superman's chest.

Canal+ has produced notably offbeat advertising in recent years, including ads with bears and dwarf clowns (via BETC) and a mockumentary about the guy behind Hollywood's most famous scream (via FCB).

The original poster artwork for many of the films in this latest campaign was intricate and memorable. (Trek's was quite dynamic, casting the outline-shape of the Star Fleet uniform badge as a dramatic "window" framing device.) Even so, the simplicity of Canal+'s sleek, stripped-down approach offers an uncluttered, clever homage that ultimately amounts to addition by subtraction.

CREDITS
Client: Canal+
Brand Management: Alice Holzman, Élodie Bassinet, Anne-Gaëlle Petri, Coline Andre
Agency: BETC, Paris
Agency Management: Bertille Toledano, Guillaume Espinet, Elsa Magadoux, Hugo Chavanel
Executive Creative Director: Stéphane Xiberras
Creative Director: Olivier Apers
Art Director: Jordan Lemarchand
Copywriter: Julien Deschamps
Traffic: Coralie Chasset
Production: Sarah Belhadj