Excellent car ads: Hyundai, Nissan, Volkswagen, Chrysler

Do car ads have to be about the car? Do they have to showcase stylish vehicles swooshing through empty landscapes? Do they have to speak about the technical details and reach the rational part of our brain...? Nah!

These are a few examples of something different
(parts from AdWeek http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/10-best-commercials-2011-136663:)



What if everything ran on gas? Then again, what if everything didn't? Those disparate visions provided the setup and payoff for this bleak, dystopian Nissan Leaf spot by TBWA\ Chiat\Day, which imagined a world in which all our devices, from clock radios to cell phones to dentist drills, guzzle gasoline like cars and spit out choking, noxious fumes. A spare piano score and the endless, dreary putt-putting of little motors provide the soundtrack for some remarkable visuals—a coffee maker yanked to life by a starter rope, a laptop replenished at a gas-filled watercooler, an office full of quietly smoking computers—all depressingly lit in flat green hues. Our antihero, a drone whose glum resignation subtly implicates the viewer in the stained legacy of oil-powered transport, eventually spies an all-electric Leaf across the street—while guiltily filling up his own Chevy Volt (a gasoline-electric hybrid) at a gas station. Roused slightly from his torpor, he nonetheless remains paralyzed and unsmiling as watches the Leaf drive off—a sober ending to one of the year's most darkly memorable spots.

And of course, this funny little thing:



This two-minute Chrysler 200 spot from Wieden + Kennedy, which broke on the Super Bowl in February, won the 2011 Emmy Award for best commercial. It's easy to see why. The year's toughest, proudest, most defiant advertisement, it offered a gritty defense of a city, an industry, and a way of life, single-handedly bringing some of the old swagger back to Detroit and attacking those who would doubt the city's heritage and conviction—or its ability to produce a worldclass luxury vehicle. "What does a town that's been to hell and back know about the finer things in life? Well, I'll tell ya. More than most," says the voiceover, so hardboiled it could have been forged in a factory. Eminem's Oscar-winning "Lose Yourself" begins thumping, as the homegrown rapper appears behind the wheel of a 200. Passing several Detroit landmarks, he stops and walks into the Fox Theatre. Backed by a choir, he points at the camera and says, "This is the Motor City. This is what we do." A tour de force and one of the high points of Super Bowl XLV, the ad wraps on the year's best tagline: "Imported from Detroit."



Agency: Deutsch, Los Angeles • Director: Lance Acord, Park Pictures • Editing: Union • Effects: CO3

Resistance is futile. At 7:33 p.m. ET on Sunday, Feb. 6, 2011, Volkswagen unleashed one of the great crowd-pleasing TV ads of all time on Fox's broadcast of Super Bowl XLV. "The Force," from Deutsch/ LA, ingeniously conceived and perfectly executed, more than lived up to its name. It took two familiar ad themes—kids and Star Wars—and merged them to create that most rare species: a true global (who knows, maybe intergalactic) pop-culture phenomenon. Backed by the imposing sounds of "The Imperial March," a child in a Darth Vader suit roams his suburban home, attempting to bend inanimate objects (and the family dog) to his will with Jedi mind tricks. He fails utterly—until Dad gets home in his Volkswagen Passat. The kid races out to the driveway and focuses all of his metaphysical energy on the midsize sedan. It roars to life obediently—thanks to Dad activating the remote starter from the house. The boy steps back, thunderstruck by his own supernatural powers. The spot's metrics are astounding: 44 million views on YouTube, a reported 6.8 billion impressions worldwide, more than $100 million in earned media—all from such a simple execution. The spot, while visually strong, isn't a wonder of craft or technique. It's a triumph of fun, unadorned storytelling, which clearly goes a long way. Few ads in history have been as charming, as clever, as perfectly paced, or as well loved as this. Simply the best of 2011.



Also read: http://howwemove.blogspot.com/2010/12/why-are-so-many-ads-yawn-triggers-and.html