Two cane toads promote the new Ford Falcon EcoBoost in new web film via JWT Melbourne
May 5 2012, 2:23 pm | | 23 Comments
Two cane toads feature in this web film for the new Ford Falcon EcoBoost via JWT Melbourne. The spot promotes the car’s six cylinder performance from a four cylinder engine.
Executive Creative Director: Richard Muntz
Creative Director: Jim Ritchie
Creative Director: Rob Beamish
Production company: Exit Films
Director: Chris & Lachlan
Producer: Peter Kearney
Puppet makers: Glasshamerfx New Zealand
23 Comments
Loved it. Funniest ad this year.
too long.
Very very good.
gross, but i liked it
Ralphie?
Nice thought in there but it’s a wee bit buried. The story isn’t as entertaining as the agency probably thinks it is….didn’t make me laugh.
Keep trying.
So at what point did 90 seconds become too long for a web film? Or am I just too old for kids these days?
Fifteen years ago, the original was still funnier.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3mXaATLeRM
It’s all in the writing.
Time is irrelevant.
Nice work Ritchie, has you written all over it.
Keep trying? Smells like Showbags is at it again… Let me just go check the gents for a smear campaign.
@animal comedy teams. Very, very good but only the nude ferret gags actually made me laugh. However there is absolutely no comparison to this ad except that there are talking animals in it which is a basic idea common to many ads and films.
The scene, the concept, the dialogue, the technique and most definitely the budgets are completely different in these 2 ads so to say that the Budweiser ads are the ‘original’ is quite funny in itself.
This ford ad is well done and made me laugh.
@Ferret
The dialogue of the Bud lizards, the traditional comedy team of a straight man who knows what’s happening and his partner who’s out of control and doesn’t, with the reversal of fortune where the smarter of the two has to suffer the consequences of his buddy’s folly is as old as Laurel and Hardy.
The fact, however, that the team are frogs, and that the most famous talking animal commercial of all time was two talking frogs, who spawned a campaign that lasted for several years, with other animals as spin-offs, through several Super Bowls, with one of the most high-profile clients of all time, all suggest that there’s more than a comparison, on nearly all the levels that you see as “completely different”.
Frankly, it’s more than absurd to argue otherwise.
The budgets, I’ll grant you, and the timing in the :90 is just too long for a punch line that you can see coming from literally miles away.
Because the last place you’d look for inspiration would be New Zealand circa 1995!
ferret, ferret, ferret….never send a ferret to do a weasels job.
Damn ladies,
Over thinking it a little aren’t we? If you heard any of these comments in a research group you’d happily dismiss them as self important twaddle that ignored the simplicity of what is in the actual spot.
I thought it was good.
Brave for Ford.
Disclaimer: No I don’t work for JWT, yes I know Muntz and Beamish well enough to know they don’t need justification here.
An encyclopaedic knowledge of commercials containing talking frogs should not detract from this excellent spot. Next the naysayers will insist we can’t have dialogue between two humans because it’s been done before. The proposition is interwoven with the idea, which is more than you can say about most ads. And I loved the gratuitous splatter. Best thing from Ford since the human witches-hats for Falcon about 40 years ago, best thing in living memory from JWT Melbourne.
It should run on primetime television so that the mainstream/mass market can see it. The rub-off would lift the entire Ford brand.
Congrats Ford and JWT. HUGE move forward in car advertising – finally! It’s funny, relevant, and makes the point about the new car big time.
This is a million times better than 60 seconds of showing us a boring car, driving down a boring highway, through boring landscape, with an even more boring family packed it in!
Thank you Rich.
@ACT so you are agreeing with me that the Budweiser commercial is not the ‘original’?
As I said not only have talking animals and talking frogs been done before many times in commercials as with other formats but the idea of the straight man and his out of control sidekick formula is as old as Laurel and Hardy?
The comedy duo in this ford ad is a classic formula with a unique script which is crafted around the scientific peculiarities of Cane Toads (not frogs) and their place as hated introduced pests in Australia.
So if you want to get precise and not generalise.
Scene… is different. There are two Cane Toads not 3 frogs. They are sitting on a road in Australia, not in a redneck swamp in Southern America. There are no cars or mountains but instead a pub and two lizards commenting on the frog’s acting ability in an ad.
Concept… ok at it’s core not completely original but definitely not exclusive to the Bud ad. However, as I have explained it is most definitely unique to Cane Toads in Australia.
Dialogue… obviously different. Especially in the case of the original Budweiser frogs who only say BUD-WEIS-ER, the cane toads do not say F-ORD do they?
In the case of the Bud Lizards who essentially discuss the acting ability of the frogs not the effects of their own poisonous secretions or the sound of a 4 cylinder vs a 6 cylinder.
Technique… Ok you may have got me here. Oh no!
Anyway they both seem to be animatronic puppets, the only difference being that the Bud ads are aided by CG and grander sets which is probably a product of budget.
The Ford ad looks to be all animatronic puppets in location. However these techniques are obviously not exclusive and definitely not invented by the Budweiser ads. Maybe look outside the small world of ads from 15 years ago to the grander and mystical world of film and TV for your ‘comparisons’ there.
Budget obviously completely different as you have agreed.
Seems neither of us are completely right, but if you want to get technical and competitive on ‘nearly all the levels that are completely different’ I do win 3 out of 5 with a 4th swinging in the middle based on different view points.
So not ‘completely different’ but yes very obviously ‘different’ and proven so.
I think the real absurdity here is that you would bother to try and discredit other peoples work in an online comment based on vague points of ‘originality’ from 15 year old ads?
Further more, I hate to regurgitate this but what the fuck is truly original today? Even in your comment you are suggesting that the comedy team of the 2 bud lizards is not original.
Frogs ssshhmogs. It could have been 10 rabbits doing gymnastics whilst discussing over population vs fuel consumption and you would have found something to complain about.
As good as this is (and it is, make no mistake) the one thing that kills it is I know the punch line from the very first moment.
@Circling Sharks aka ACT aka Animal Comedy Teams – why didn’t you just bring up this punchline critique in the first place? It’s a far more valid point to make than the quite vague originality discrediting game?
I see your point but I would also say that the punchline being obvious is a means of enticing the viewer to watch until the end. It’s the whole point of the road / car / cane toad setup and the conclusive gratuitous splatter. Essentially, given the setup what the audience wants to see is the toad getting splattered and they are given this with some quite over the top gore. I believe it’s called audience satisfaction. (take into consideration who this is marketed to)
Maybe you need to stop looking at other ads and go back to school. I can give you some after hours tutoring if you want?
The voices are really well done.
Who are the 2 blokes doing these toad voices
If they make anuvva toad advert they should only use large live Cane Toads.
They need to run over a long lines of live 2 KILO plus full grown females.
The females are bigger and bloatier than the bloke toads and provide much more splattery innards.
The resulting splatter of mass cane toad guts wood be visually much better than this 2 act small toad special effect.
Slaughtering the large sized critters is a tradition in QLD, The North Coast of NSW,.,and now the NT.
It’s a mega buzz, spotlighting Canies with ya mates. Scampering about the bush, and then thumping and stabbing these deadly lumps of toxicity with clubs, bats and spears while arf arsed pissed.
It’s a top way to get through the steamy summers.
Stops ya goin troppo and the toads make triffik compost.
DON’T DRINK AND DRIVE WHILE HELPING TO RID AUSTRALIA OF THIS DEADLY TOXIC MENACE.