car trouble
May 21st, 2010 // 2:36 pm @ admin // No Comments yet
Hello there. I’ve just been watching that new Ford S-max ad on the telly. You know, the one where all kinds of exciting people doing all kinds of exciting stuff are projected onto various bits of the car. There’s a surfer going over the roof, a mountaineer scaling the tailgate, a gyroplane thingy landing on the bonnet. Oh, hang on, just watch the film instead…
Proper exciting isn’t it? The thing is though, you’re average S-max is never going to see any of that kind of action is it? Chances are that most days it’ll have three kids in the back, alternately screaming, fighting and being sick – and it’s more demanding journeys will involve circling the car park at Asda for an hour or so while some chancer in a Citroen Saxo with black windows, pumping out N-dubz at a volume that’s making children cry three post codes away, dives into the solitary parking space that’s eternally out of reach. It’s bit like those old ads for sanitary products where the lucky buyer goes hang-gliding, scuba diving or disco dancing, then gets dragged along a sea front on roller-skates by two big mad dalmatians. All very glamorous but slightly detached from the mundanity of real life.
That’s ok though isn’t it? Because the last thing we want from car ads is reality. We want to see those shiny rascals hurtling along a mountain road unsullied by speed ramps, gatso cameras and three mile tailbacks. We want to see them pulling up outside chic bistros and boutiques with great big parking spaces wide-open and waiting for us. Because the sad reality is, if anyone produced a car ad showing what we can actually do with our cars these days, it’d be the most boring film we’ve ever seen.
Unless, of course, you really fancy a five hour movie of a rep picking his nose on the M25.
Category : Uncategorized
Dub stylee.
May 13th, 2010 // 1:46 pm @ admin // 2 Comments
Hello there. If you’re a regular reader of thatandywhiteblog you’ll know that I’m a fearless explorer of the world of Advertising. Every day I’m out there seeking out the truth on your behalf and exposing it on these pages. It’s ok. You’re welcome. No, really. It’s no trouble.
Anyway, this week I made another interesting discovery. More and more of the ads you’re watching on TV these days are dubbed. Yes, dubbed. They’ve been produced for foreign markets then, with a copywriter‘s swift reworking, some crafty editing and video jiggery-pokery they’re shown on our screens in “English”.
It’s all part of the globalisation of products that has also led to name changes like “Marathon” to “Snickers”, “Jif” to “Cif” and “Unmitigated crap” to “N-dubz”.
Have a close look at this Renault Clio ad and you’ll see what I mean.
It’s not too bad really is it?
The words kind of fit the movement of the mouths and stuff, but it does lead to more worrying thoughts:
What were they really saying on there?
Did the older bloke say that beardy at least had a nice car?
Did beardy really say “daughter”?
Or was it something altogether racier?
There’s no real way of knowing.
I did do a bit more research into the whole dubbing thing though and it turns out that it’s been going on for years. Did you know, for example, that the classic propaganda piece “The Battleship Potemkin” actually started life as Russia’s version of ” Carry on cruising“?
Bloody hilarious it was too.
Category : Uncategorized
