A baseball player shagging fly balls would hardly seem to be a visually stimulating cinematic proposition. But when the player is Ichiro Suzuki (a.k.a. Ichiro), last year’s American League Most Valuable Player and Rookie of the Year, and his outfield exploits are captured on film by director/cinematographer Lionel Coleman of Complete Pandemonium, San Francisco, the result is an eye-popping experience.
Going back to his roots in documentaries and as an in-house filmmaker for Nike, lensing assorted sports luminaries (e.g., Michael Jordan, Ken Griffey Jr., Carl Lewis), Coleman directed and shot Ichiro in this spot for the Japanese market, promoting sports drink Yunker for Tokyo agency Hakuhodo.
Coleman deployed a Maverick motorcycle outfitted with a Steadicam to keep pace with the fleet-footed Ichiro. We see the player as poetry in motion, caught in full, powerful stride as he nearly flies into outfield fences, hauling in what would be homeruns if defended by normal outfielders.
Years ago in a famous phrase, the fielding glove of Willie Mays was called simply and succinctly the place "where triples die." Mays remains arguably the greatest baseball player of all time. Yet this description of his fielding prowess also could be applied to Ichiro, who today is recognized as one of the game’s best defensive outfielders ever. In this spot he becomes almost larger than life.
As we see Ichiro repeatedly go back to glove would-be extra-base hits, a voiceover relates that we might know him as a seven-time Japanese League batting champion, or the American League Rookie of the Year, or a golden-gloved all-star, or the reigning American League MVP. But we probably don’t know his sports drink—at least not yet.
The outfield action then cuts to a product shot—a bottle of Yunker—before we return to Ichiro as he’s in full gallop, about to frustrate another hitter.
Coleman’s support team at Complete Pandemonium included executive producer Clint Goldman and production manager George Simkins. The action was shot on location at Edison Field, Anaheim, Calif.
For Hakuhodo, Masato Yamamoto served as creative director, art director and copywriter. PMC, Los Angeles, was a stateside liaison for Hakuhodo on the job. George Braun of PMC was exec producer. The spot’s producers were Hakuhodo’s Kazunori Fujikura and PMC’s Doug Dilge.
"Wall Play" was edited by freelancer Mauro Camoroda. Online editor/Inferno effects artist was Simon Mowbray of Radium, San Francisco. Colorist was the mono-monikered Crash of R!OT Santa Monica.
Other Radium artisans on the job were visual effects supervisor Rob Hubbard of Radium, Santa Monica; CG artists Mark Malmberg and Andrew Sinagra of Radium, San Francisco; executive producers Anastacia Feldman of Radium, San Francisco, and Steve Schofield of Radium, Santa Monica; and effects producers Sally Carter and Carla Attansio, of Radium’s San Francisco and Santa Monica facilities, respectively.
Reinhard Denke of stimmüng, Santa Monica, was the sound designer/audio engineer. Music composer was the mono-monikered Veigar of Presto Music Productions, Los Angeles.
