Avant-garde filmography has always been best as short films. Un Chein Andalou, Owzat, The Beat Generation, Al Dente, My Wrongs 8245-8249 & 117, This Brick, and a peculiar, intriguing 1987 piece, ‘The Way Things Work’.
By contrast, with ‘avant-garde’ TV adverts, the polar inverse applies. They need length. There’s nothing wrong with 30 second clips, of course, if you’re a Tango advert. You might be, but Tango adverts are unlikely to incorporate anything that isn’t humorous. Rube Goldberg machines, however, can’t not be humorous. It’s not quite up their alley, but the fact that the machines exist is humorous. That’s the point. An eccentric, unnecessary way of performing a simple task, and the humour doesn’t stop there. Have you seen these things? Yes, it’s more “wow, okay, that was good”, as opposed to “well that was funny”, but they’re funny things for sure.
The aforementioned short film ‘The Way Things Go’ would seem to swap humour for some sort of pseudo-commentary on… well that’s my point… something that isn’t there. Ersatz subject matter. It’s 30 minutes long, and it keeps the eyes watching. Still, 30 minutes? Would it not start to get boring somewhere? Wouldn’t it be great it distilled in two say, an advert, not a short advert as I mentioned, because it wouldn’t be a suitable format. A long advert. 2 minutes long.
Honda did just this in 2003. ‘Cog’, a two minute advertisement, sees the components of a Honda Accord dismantled and then re-arranged in a delicate Goldberg machine. It took 606 takes to perfect, which I think assures that this advert will be entertaining, and no one takes so long to do something so unnecessary. As it went down though, ‘Cog’ followed the likes of John West Tuna and Reebok to produce classic early-2000s British advertisements. As a seemingly long, non-stop shot, it follows the like of Tango Blackcurrant’s famous ‘St George’ advert. Also, neither adverts are really long panning shots, because Honda would have hired the longest hallway going, and they were both aired only 10 times in full.
I normally associate it’s launch date, April 2003, as Nostalgia Peakus, what with it being the peak of my nostalgia, just for corny stuff like Now 54 and the 11 88 88advert. When this advert went out, it apparently became the new talk of the water cooler officers, of the pint drinkers, of the school kids, such is the power of a really good advertisement – it gets everyone involved.
Honda’s Cog concept isn’t that they’ve just found another way to use the parts of a car, but to metaphor the advert slogan “isn’t it great when things just…work” which really refers to the sturdy yet simplistic Accord, a nice idea lost in subsequent inspired adverts such as Guinness’ 2007 ‘Tipping Point’ advert, which, though using a Goldberg machine, meant Guinness and only Guinness – a stylish update on their swimming and snail race adverts from the same campaign. ‘Cog’ inspired several parodies, from BBC Radio Merseyside to the newly launched 118 118, whose machine only works because the two mascots play several roles as components in the machine. Cheating, much?
Nah. It just added a bit of physical humour to the interesting concept that is the Rube Goldberg machine. From adverts (like this Honda advert, Coca-Cola, Guinness, Heinz, Sugar Puffs), music videos (OK Go, The Bravery, Fatboy Slim) and board games like Mouse Trap, its humour that captivates the public consciousness - there isn’t anyone who doesn’t like watching these things.
I've reposted this from the other blog I made on Wordpress which is accidental.
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