I'll leave you with this animated Terry Gilliam Christmas Card from 1968, via Bleeding Cool.
Have a great one. I'll be back next week with my top posts of 2011.
Tampilkan postingan dengan label Christmas. Tampilkan semua postingan
Tampilkan postingan dengan label Christmas. Tampilkan semua postingan
Jumat, 23 Desember 2011
F'd Ad Fridays: The bad old days
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| Via TrèsSugar |
Perhaps life was simpler back then. But can you really call that living?
F'd Ad Fridays: Now THAT's an "orgy wonderland"
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| Via Guyism |
F'd Ad Fridays: Under the Cameltoe
Yup.
F'd Ad Fridays: T-Mobile's Xmas flash mob is an orgy of suck
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| Oops. |
Also, forcing generously-figured gospel singers to wear the same slinky pink dress reminds me of really unfortunate matching bridesmaids. One look does not fit all.
F'd Ad Fridays: F'ing Xmas Edition
All day today, I'll be featuring really bad ads and general pop culture crap for Xmas 2012.
Here's a start, from down under:
Via AdFreak
Here's a start, from down under:
Via AdFreak
Kamis, 22 Desember 2011
"Merry Christmas" is not a dirty word (okay, "words")
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| Via Shutterstock |
Merry Christmas, dammit. That is not a religious statement to me. I may come from a Christian-based culture, but Christmas has far outgrown its origins as a religious holiday. It's secular to me. Pagan tree totems, Coca-Cola Santas, Rudolf cartoons... you can get through the entire season without once being filled with the Love of Christ. And I like it that way.
Our days of the week are named after gods who no longer hold sway over us, as they did over some of our ancestors. For a thousand plus years, as Christianity spread Borg-like through the western world, it assimilated all the sundry bits of tradition in found along the way. Finally, it met its match with the growing consumerism and over-the-top sentimentalism of the 19th Century, and the holiday we know today started to take shape.
Our Christmas is a Victorian invention. And it is a mostly secular thing now, celebrated by countless non- and ex-Christians around the world.
Sure, there are still people who enjoy the religious aspects. Great. But they no longer own the holiday. It is a cultural tradition that belongs to everyone who wants to share a nice tradition of sharing time, gifts and food and drink with people during the year's darkest days.
Want an example that doesn't come from me? My brother David sent me a CBC article about this Christmas video made by international students from the University of Windsor:
I also love this quote from the article: "From all types of religions and beliefs and non-religions, too, nobody has ever felt bad about it," said international student advisor Henrique Chacon. "They feel included when somebody comes to them and says, 'merry Christmas.'"
Merry Christmas, Henrique. And Merry Christmas to the rest of you. You can keep your "Happy Holidays". I never did like generic brands.
Arnold Worldwide's Christmas "card" is cute
And labour/planning intensive. Acart could never pull this off. Our building only has 6 storeys.
Rabu, 21 Desember 2011
Christmas toys weigh in on the abortion debate
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| via AdFreak |
Thanks, Niagara Region Right to Life. Because what a complex scientific and ethical debate about the nature of humanity and reproductive rights really needs... is more crying nutcrackers.
Jumat, 16 Desember 2011
Paranoël Activity
I'm pretty damn pleased with our agency Christmas card this year. Written and Directed by Acart Copywriter/Videographer Christopher Redmond, it takes a different perspective on that supernatural old guy who breaks into your house once a year while you and your children are asleep:
Thanks to DOP Karl Roeder for helping out.
And some of you may recognize the scary little boy. He has certainly kept me up on many a night.
Kamis, 15 Desember 2011
Toys for tots, tits, tatts
With Christmas within arm's reach, all kinds of marketers are trying to get a piece of the spirit. It sometimes leads to odd couplings.
Chicago's Admiral Theater, which despite the classy name is actually a strip club, is offering to exchange one free lap dance for a donation of a toy for charity.
In Memphis, Tattoo artist Jay Guzman is offering free tatts for a toy donation to his favourite Christian cause.
Huffington Post says that when customers bring in a toy worth $25 or more, Monday through Wednesday, they can get a tattoo or piercing of comparable price in exchange. Guzman said in an interview, "Everybody associates tattoo artists with being criminals, bikers, degenerates — and I'm a believing Christian and I believe what better way to be Christ-like than by giving back."
It's a good point. Strip clubs, tattoo parlours... if Jesus the man were here right now, that's exactly where he would do his ministry: among the very people his more hypocritical followers despise.
Chicago's Admiral Theater, which despite the classy name is actually a strip club, is offering to exchange one free lap dance for a donation of a toy for charity.
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| Aren't all lap dances for the "needy"? |
Huffington Post says that when customers bring in a toy worth $25 or more, Monday through Wednesday, they can get a tattoo or piercing of comparable price in exchange. Guzman said in an interview, "Everybody associates tattoo artists with being criminals, bikers, degenerates — and I'm a believing Christian and I believe what better way to be Christ-like than by giving back."
It's a good point. Strip clubs, tattoo parlours... if Jesus the man were here right now, that's exactly where he would do his ministry: among the very people his more hypocritical followers despise.
Rabu, 14 Desember 2011
NZ church keeps up its irreverent Christian holiday ad tradition
St Matthews in the City Church in Auckland, NZ, is known for its controversial billboards. This Christmas, they did not disappoint:
Here's a clearer image:
Well, how would you react if you were an engaged homeless virgin who just found out she was pregnant?
Vicar Glynn Cardy says the irreverent ad has a serious Christmas message:
"It's real. Christmas is real. It's about a real pregnancy, a real mother and a real child. It's about real anxiety, courage and hope. This billboard portrays Mary, Jesus' mother, looking at a home pregnancy test kit revealing that she is pregnant. Regardless of any premonition, that discovery would have been shocking. Mary was unmarried, young, and poor. This pregnancy would shape her future. She was certainly not the first woman in this situation or the last."
Screw the haters. I love these guys.
Other great St. Mathews billboards:
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| Via stuff.co.nz and Copyranter |
Here's a clearer image:
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| Via The Daily Mail |
Vicar Glynn Cardy says the irreverent ad has a serious Christmas message:
"It's real. Christmas is real. It's about a real pregnancy, a real mother and a real child. It's about real anxiety, courage and hope. This billboard portrays Mary, Jesus' mother, looking at a home pregnancy test kit revealing that she is pregnant. Regardless of any premonition, that discovery would have been shocking. Mary was unmarried, young, and poor. This pregnancy would shape her future. She was certainly not the first woman in this situation or the last."
Screw the haters. I love these guys.
Other great St. Mathews billboards:
Senin, 12 Desember 2011
PETA helps humans (for a change)
I have plenty of issues with some of PETA's promotional tactics, like sexploitation and making fun of human tragedy, but this campaign I really like.
Last week, PETA donated 100 cast-off fur coats to the Greater Cincinnati Coalition for the Homeless, noting that people on the street are "the only people who have any excuse to wear them." They were then distributed free-of-charge.
Of course, they made note of the fact that all the furs had been "donated by erstwhile fur-wearers who, once they found out that animals on fur farms are often bludgeoned or genitally electrocuted, couldn't stand to have carcasses in their closets." PETA marks the coats to make resale impossible, and issues tax receipts to donors.
Donated furs are also used as bedding for animals in wildlife rehabilitation centers, or as props in anti-fur demos.
American audiences are not quite ready for Santa's other helper
No, not Zwarte Piet — although he's not welcome either in the New World.
This is Krampus, an Alpine demon who "finds a particularly naughty child, it stuffs the child in its sack and carries the frightened thing away to its lair, presumably to devour for its Christmas dinner."
What can I say? Those mountain volk are hardcore.
The specific Krampus tale in question is a stop-motion animation (the old-school technique used in the Rudolph Christmas classic) of the Krampmeister showing up at the home of some naughty kinder, licking them with his foot-long tongue, thrashing the scheiße out of them and carrying them off. Doesn't it just warm your heart?
The short was produced for the holiday edition of Anthony Bourdain's Travel Channel show, No Reservations. According to Gawker, following news of the horrific Penn State child rapes and wide-ranging repercussions, the network felt it was just not the right time to lay this trip on America's parents and pulled it.
This is Krampus, an Alpine demon who "finds a particularly naughty child, it stuffs the child in its sack and carries the frightened thing away to its lair, presumably to devour for its Christmas dinner."
What can I say? Those mountain volk are hardcore.
The specific Krampus tale in question is a stop-motion animation (the old-school technique used in the Rudolph Christmas classic) of the Krampmeister showing up at the home of some naughty kinder, licking them with his foot-long tongue, thrashing the scheiße out of them and carrying them off. Doesn't it just warm your heart?
The short was produced for the holiday edition of Anthony Bourdain's Travel Channel show, No Reservations. According to Gawker, following news of the horrific Penn State child rapes and wide-ranging repercussions, the network felt it was just not the right time to lay this trip on America's parents and pulled it.
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