Television Commercials

[denti alligator]

The Brothers Quay did some commercials for weed killer, among other things (like Coke, I think).

[Nadsat]

Ingmar Bergman directed some commercials too, didn't he?

Yes, he did a commercial for a swedish soap brand called Bris in the 50's.

[flyonthewall2983]

Let us not forget the (good, IE Ridley Scott) directors who started out, in part, doing commercials. Ridley's "1984" commercial for the Super Bowl way back when is still a landmark in advertising.

[Antoine Doinel]

David Mamet has directed two commercials for Ford. You can see them here and here.

[Oedipax]

I uploaded this commercial by Godard and Anne-Marie Mieville to Youtube a while back. It's a favorite of mine

I'd like to see the Nike one with John Zorn music, if anyone knows where to find it...

[ltfontaine]

I bet Hou Hsiao Hsien would never make a commercial.

He's made at least three, one of which, for Air France, is currently available for viewing at youtube. Another, for Kirin beer, is listed at the Sinomovie website, but I've not seen it. I have a third on file someplace, for an insurance company, I think. I'll share it if I can find it.

[Nadsat]

Ingmar Bergman directed some commercials too, didn't he?

Yes, he did a commercial for a swedish soap brand called Bris in the 50's.

And you could watch some of them here

[Hai2u]

Here are 2 Nike ads by Terry Gilliam.

The Secret Tournament

The Rematch

[Antoine Doinel]

Volvo ad directed by Stephen Frears and starring Robert Downey Jr.

[colinr0380]

The Secret Tournament

The Rematch

Was it just me or did anyone else want to see the losing teams horribly killed in the manner of Cube when they lost their match?

After all they were playing their game locked in a metal cage!

At least the second one results in the players drowning (if you ignore the last image!)

[Antoine Doinel]

Here's a new American Express ad featuring Martin Scorsese, Ellen DeGeneres, Sheryl Crow and some other people.

[colinr0380]

A couple more commercials, this time for Pirelli.

One by Antoine Fuqua with John Malkovich and Naomi Campbell

And the other by Kathryn Bigelow with Uma Thurman (I think the subtext of this one is that everyone is after her because they still remember Batman and Robin and still hold a grudge! But after a while, and a couple of decent films, everyone forgives and forgets and the world seems much less threatening!)

[Rsdio]

Jonathan Glazer has done some fantastic stuff, some before and some after he started making features. The most famous is the Guiness one with the horses and surfers, which was voted the winner of a '100 best ads' poll in the UK.

There's another two for Guiness here and here.

One for Levi's.

One for Live Aid.

One for Motorola.

And his most recent, for Sony Bravia.

[Antoine Doinel]

Here's an ad for the Nintendo DS with, uh, Nicole Kidman.

[flyonthewall2983]

Here's an ad for the Nintendo DS with, uh, Nicole Kidman.

It'd be almost perfect if the voiceover was in Japanese.

[Antoine Doinel]

New Paul McCartney video directed by Michel Gondry and starring Natalie Portman.

[dadaistnun]

Cronenberg did a Nike commercial years ago. It even had a shoe in a pod, if I remember correctly.

The Cronenberg ad.

I had thought the music was by John Zorn, a little sleuthing reveals the composer/sound designer to be David Slusser (who has worked with Zorn).

[The Elegant Dandy Fop]

New Paul McCartney video directed by Michel Gondry and starring Natalie Portman.

I don't get it. What the heck's goin' on? Just a bunch of ghosts running around.

[Matt]

David Lynch will do an ad for a new Gucci women's fragrance. He's done perfume before, most memorably a series of ads for Calvin Klein (Obsession, wasn't it?) that featured "Twin Peaks" actors.

[colinr0380]

New Paul McCartney video directed by Michel Gondry and starring Natalie Portman.

I don't get it. What the heck's goin' on? Just a bunch of ghosts running around.

I think it is about the power of the song (or the magical mandolin) conjuring up the spirits of different objects: knifes and forks, the trees, the pictures on the wall, the fireplace, the washing machine, the fridge are brought into existence by the spirit of the mandolin (played by Portman). She becomes real at one point and McCartney turns into a ghost after she does some kind of explosive trick on the mandolin(!) and the ghosts all return but to the wrong places (so the tree spirit goes into the knife drawer, the fire goes into the washing machine and the washing machine spirit goes into the fireplace!)

It seems to fit the style of Gondry's other music videos - Dead Leaves & The Dirty Ground by The White Stripes had the walls of an empty house having the events that occured projected onto them, as if the walls of the house had been imprinted somehow with the emotion of the events from the past. The image of Natalie Portman as a ghost momentarily sitting in the same chair as the flesh and blood Paul McCartney reminded me of the Bjork Hyperballad video where the 'spirit' of Bjork is projected, and sings, over what seems to be Bjork's dead body!

I like the way the McCartney video still keeps the strange mix of upbeat and creepy from Gondry's other works! I don't know how in control of all these ghosts McCartney is, but he seems happy enough to be in a ghostly club at the end. However Mackenzie Crook's postman seems to have been dragged kicking and screaming there, leaving his van abandoned in an abortive attempt at escaping!

[The Invunche]

Nike Football Leave Nothing by Michael Mann with music from Last of the Mohicans.

Apologies for the video quality.

[Matt]

Wes Anderson's AT&T Commercials

[Saarijas]

I love in the one about a film star, when he says he works in a part of South America you have never heard of, he says Hi "Klaus" to a white man surrounded by natives, obviously a reference to Fitzcarraldo.

[pianocrash]

Larry Pine has a posse!

[Antoine Doinel]

Michel Gondry's wonderful advert for Razr2, downloadable in HD.