Hasta La Creative!

Sheb Wooley comes screaming out of the mists of pop culture into the commercial mainstream in FCB's new campaign for pay-TV channel Canal+ in Spain.

Wooley is the voice actor who performed the "Wilhelm scream," a ubiquitous sound effect that debuted in the 1951 adventure Distant Drum and has since been dubbed into more than 200 movies, including Toy Story and the Star Wars, Lord of the Rings and Indiana Jones series. It takes its name from Private Wilhelm, a character in the 1953 western The Charge at Feather River. (Modern auteurs like George Lucas, Quentin Tarantino, Peter Jackson and Steven Spielberg apparently use the scream in their productions whenever possible.)

The ad below, by FCB Spain and FCB Los Angeles, stars Wooley's widow, Linda Dotson Wooley, as "The Woman Who Can't Watch Movies"—because she's afraid she'll hear her husband's famous scream. The mockumentary points to a website that encourage folks to "donate" their screams and overdub Wooley so Linda can enjoy Hollywood films again. The site lets you record screams for up to three movie clips and share the results with friends. They'll really appreciate that.

Even though it's all a goof, I kept thinking that Linda could just watch something outside Wooley's filmography—like the Scream movies or Home Alone, in which, it seems, Macaulay Culkin handled the screamy honors himself.

CREDITS
Client: Canal+
Agency: FCB Spain; FCB Los Angeles
Campaign: "Leave Wilhelm Alone"
Client Contacts: Iñaki Martikorena, Bernardo Melero, Purification González
Executive Creative Directors: Pedro Soler, Eric Springer
Creative Team: Beatriz Pedrosa, Peio Azkoaga, Joao Freitas
Producers: Brendan Kiernan, Steve Devore, Thomas Anderson, Kate Borkowski, Kepa Vizcay
Production Company: Helo
Director: Alex Grossman
Lighting: Seamus Tierney
Sound: Sam Tornero Pulido
Web Developers: Carlos Lainez, Miguel Iglesias
App Developers: Joan Arbó, Jorge Cubillo
Social Media Strategy: Mauro Rodriguez, Jose Olivares
Poster: Beatriz Pedrosa, Marian de la Fuente
Planner: Manuel López

The future of “The Michael J. Fox Show” does not look good, but Mr. Fox is concentrating on making sure the last seven episodes that were filmed are actually seen by audiences.

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Hasan & Partners teamed up with production company B-Reel on a new integrated campaign for Helsingin Sanomat, the largest subscription newspaper in Finland. The new campaign highlights the paper’s journalistic strength and integrity, with the tagline “One story, all the angles.”

The campaign is based around a television spot of the same name, set in a birthing suite. “One story, all the angles” examines the moments directly following a birth from multiple perspectives — mother, father, doctor and nurse — with accompanying headlines like “Not enough potential workers in female dominated professions,” “Acknowledging paternity now easier,” and “Global birth rate declining.” To accomplish this, B-Reel and director Johan Perjus “moved through the Caravaggio-style still life scenery with a live camera, tracking and compositing info graphics, adding volumetric light and a delicate grade, among other things.” It’s an interesting approach that makes for a distinctly cinematic 34 second ad.

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Th1ng director/animator Sylvain Chomet received a personal request from The Simpsons creator Matt Groening to animate the iconic “couch gag” that concludes the opening credits of the show, now entering its 26th season. Obviously, you don’t turn down a personal request from Matt Groenig, so the three-time Oscar nominee Chomet offered up a distinctly French take on the gag, which was just revealed online today.

Chomet joins an illustrious list of individuals invited by Groening to animate the sequence, including Bill Plympton, Banksy, and Guillermo Del Toro. Indeed, in recent years the couch gag has all too often overshadowed the rest of the episode. Executive producer Dominic Buttimore (Bart Simpson would have a field day with that one), a longtime collaborator, “worked closely with Chomet to create and storyboard the concept for the animation sequence, which was immediately met with ‘laughter and appreciation’ by Groening and Simpsons’ longtime show-runner/producer Al Jean. Jean went as far as to call the experience a “dream come true.”

The new couch gag (featured above) is one of the show’s best, thanks to some great jokes and Chomet’s inimitable animation style. It will air during the episode “Diggs” this Sunday, March 9th. Stick around after the jump for credits and couch gags from Plympton and Banksy. continued…

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In addition to having the word “farm” in the title, Riester’s 30 second spot also has a similar (perhaps Chipotle-inspired) approach to Chobani’s “Farmland” spot. Like that ad, “Farm” emphasizes the natural ingredients they put in their Greek yogurt (in this case Voskos), while employing pastoral shots of cows and fresh fruit. Unlike the Chobani spot, “Farm” doesn’t spend time taking down the competition, instead launching into the brand’s virtues, via the cheery voiceover and footage of a girl picking fruit with her family and enjoying a cup of Voskos while sitting on a fence. It’s a slightly simpler tactic than Chobani’s, foregoing the takedown of competitors for more of an emphasis on wholesomeness. The brand’s “Happiness in Every Spoonful” tagline exemplifies the slight difference in approach — whereas Chobani takes a stab at competitors (while opening themselves up to scrutiny), Voskos just wants to let you know that their yogurt tastes good and will make you happy. Credits after the jump. continued…

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Fox Sports will learn this season if it was a good move to replace Joe Buck’s longtime M.L.B. broadcast partner, Tim McCarver, with Harold Reynolds and Tom Verducci.