Think John Lewis for the Gifts You're ACHING to Give

Here's the requisite bittersweet holiday-countdown ad that yields inhuman cravings for tinsel and an advent calendar. (I have one already. It is sitting on the shelf and I twitch every time I look at it, because if you forget to start opening the little paper doors right on December 1, ALL IS LOST AND GOD HATES YOU.)

Anyway, this piece for UK-based John Lewis department store (now online and on mobile!) takes its sweet time building a nostalgic universe around an antsy boy in the days before Christmas. We can all relate to his impatience, even if his reasons turn out to be warmly opposite our expectations.

The ad is pensively punctuated by a delicate cover of The Smiths' "Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want" by Slow Moving Millie. Catch the making-of, plus a link to download the music on iTunes, on the John Lewis website.

This cosy fireside holiday ham is brought to you by Adam & Eve.

Audi + Bose: A Match Made in Minimalism

Today Bertrand over at VOTW bombed me with a bunch of ads I haven't seen, kindly catching me up after a short vacation. This was my favourite. For Audi's "A Big Idea: Condensed" campaign, BBH London expresses the power of the A1's integrated Bose speakers using imagery that pops hard and a cinematic voiceover. Both brands were served nicely. They didn't even need the full 30 seconds; 11 did the job fine.

Pack it small but pack a punch. Masterful work in a genre where little changes and little art is left.

Can't wait to watch and hoard campaign variations; it's healthy candy for the eyes. One last pretty pretty for the road:

Milk: A Love Story (+ a Lesson in Semantic Strategy)

I like this because it speaks to our compulsion to personify the non-human and wrap stories around them, seeking meaning and a means to connect where oftentimes there isn't any.

Obviously this is an ad, so there is clearly a message that's constructed and conveyed, and you are meant to sympathise with the cartons of milk. (Something new to discuss in therapy!) Still, as the video progresses you can literally feel your brain trying to catch the cues: here you're supposed to see a face, there a flirtation, here a kiss.

This work you do of completing that web of meaning in your mind is sometimes just enough to justify a bond.

The ending is easy to guess well before, but I like how it concludes by leaving the viewer with a sense of agency over the tale instead of giving you the flat, too-easy "...and this is why you should...!"

By Catsnake for Friends of the Earth, UK. The website could be more engaging, especially now that I'm all emotionally invested in two empty estranged cartons. FOE, you could've turned that call to action into more than a mere flirtation with agency. You could have directed the (now primed) energies of those who want to change the story and save the world.

(Consider the Rainbow Warrior.)

'Litany' by The Independent

"Litany," by Lowe Worldwide for The Independent, launched in 2000 and still makes a nice, melodic watch.

You will occasionally feel provoked. You'll wonder what this is building to, what revolutionary slogan you're about to get sandbagged with ... but the conclusion is simply the product itself, quietly parked on a porch step with a last accompanying "...don't read."

You are moved, but not overworked. You understand.

What finesse.

Via Georges Mohammed-Chérif of the infamous Buzzman, which most recently graced us with a convoy of falling angels.

'They have a well-balanced diet of sandwiches ... and pens.'

I love Whirled and would marry it if I could, then divorce it three times just so I could marry it four times.

Here's its latest for Law & Order: UK. Bonus: it uses the voiceover actor from our version. You'll learn how the justice system differs on that side of the Atlantic, as well as new words like "copper" ("policeman!") and "mum" ("mom").

It's a little long but you can just feel the glee that went into the scene-mashing. It's infectious and slightly crazed. Also...

Wait for the double rainbow reference!

Debtris: The Game of US/UK Debts (Among Other Things)

This data visualisation illustrates expenditures that have contributed to US debt, Tetris-style. It's a fun watch if you like stress.



Note there's a lot of other info in there that's not strictly tied to US debt: Wall St. bonuses in '09 ($115 billion), WalMart's revenue ($405 billion), what it would cost to save the Amazon ($21 billion), and annual donations to charity made by Americans ($308 billion).

Enough randomness to make the name of the video deceptive (if catchy).

Humor me ››

Mother London Breeds a Fresh Crop of Gullibles for Next Year.

Nodding to all the estranged princesses and Nigerian CEOs that overrun your email with promises of untold fortune, Mother London decided to write its own such letter and give the entirety of the Christmas budget to the first guy to answer.

Turns out that out of hundreds of emails sent, demanding a full name and bank details, only one guy was dumb enough sufficiently compelled by the belief in Christmas miracles to respond.

So they pay him a visit. With a suitcase full of cash. Which the winner in turn decides to......

...well, you just have to watch it. This definitely wins the race for best agency holiday greeting though.* Guess the rest of you slackers can just hang out and colour until January.

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*Actually this one by kirshenbaum bond senecal + partners was kind of all right. No, not really. What's ad land's fixation with self-aware body hair?

Your Domestic Flights Hurt Bears.

This stressful piece of web cinema is brought to you by Plane Stupid, with help from agency Mother and production firm Rattling Stick.

The argument: every passenger on a given European flight is responsible for the addition of 400kg of greenhouse gases -- the weight of an adult polar bear.

Humor me ››

Space: An Armchair Viewer's Next Frontier

With "Space Chair Project" for the Regza SV, Grey London aspired to bring Toshiba's "Leading innovation" tagline to the next level: stratospheric.

This is an amazing thing to watch, in part because it's something we've never seen before, but also because it represents the penetration of something utterly banal -- in this case, a chair -- into a sphere most of us can't even imagine crossing into ourselves.

IT'S (the edge of) SPACE, BITCHES!

Also, footage was taken with Toshiba cameras. More plus for the brand.