21 Apr 2006
Commercials Can Be Expensive
Every year, the Regina Public Library Film Theatre, a repertory theatre (don’t worry, I had to look it up, too) located here in town, would screen a film entitled “The World’s Best Commercials” I think for only one night. It’s a showcase of the winners of the Cannes Lions Award winners from the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival. Entries have come from the USA, Canada, the UK, France, Brazil, Australia, you name it. If you thought the Super Bowl Commercials were good, you haven’t seen anything, yet. These aren’t run through the Jesusland filter.
I’ve tried to make a habit of going every time the RPL screens the next year’s edition, but I’ve only actually been to a few, the last time being in 1999 or 2000. Added below is one from the UK by BBH, advertising Lynx body spray. You might know this brand under a different name here in Canada, Axe. This was from The World’s Best Commercials, 1997. I wonder why I remember it so well…
Now, AdFilms here in Canada used to offer many of the different years for purchase for a few hundred dollars a pop, presumably for educational institutes, but that part of their site seems to no longer exist. And I seriously doubt they’ll ever be available for joe public in some kind of DVD or DVD-esque format. I assume the high price tag is due to some kind of weird advertising licensing thing. What is it with commercials? If they’re current, you can pay a service not to see them; if they’re old, you pay a service to see them.
Sometimes I feel there are entire money-making market schemes opportunities just passing me by.
Update: BTW, the song in the Lynx commercial is “Boom Shack-A-Lak” by Apache Indian. You can find it on Make Way for the Indian. Apparently, he’s done a new version of “Israelites” with Desmond Dekker, shown here:
You can see Desmond Dekker’s original version here:
Which reminds me of this Maxell commercial from many years ago:
And just because I like to make you people scroll, here’s something to top it off. Bobby McFerrin, Bill Irwin, and Robin Williams.
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