The daily commute can be a jungle. Motorists act like animals. But in this case, they’re turning to animals as the preferred mode of transportation.
In "Animals," an international :60 for Fiat (not airing in the U.S.), we see a double-parked giraffe nibble greenery on a second-story balcony. A commuter on a tiger tries to beat a yellow traffic light, zooming past another man who’s riding a lion. A garage door opens to reveal a hippopotamus. A pedestrian provides some guidance so that a woman can parallel park her elephant. Amidst this hustle and bustle, we watch a man and a woman zip comfortably about in their new Fiat Puntos.
The spot’s visual metaphor—that the Punto is a special breed of automotive animal—was born out of a collaboration among director/cameraman Eric Saarinen of Plum Productions, Santa Monica; Venice, Calif.-based visual effects house Digital Domain; and agency Leo Burnett Co., Milan, Italy.
All of the animals in the commercial are real, but every scene is a dense digital illusion. Most of the animal shots were done over five days on a back lot at Paramount Pictures, Hollywood. Using a greenscreen, each animal was filmed separately and followed carefully choreographed routes in order to make the elements match precisely.
"It helps to have a really good animal trainer," explained Saarinen. "Each animal has a different psyche. The elephants, for example, are very intelligent, willing collaborators. On the other hand, the ostriches would veer off like unguided missiles. Their eyes are bigger than their brains."
Eleven species of animals were used in the production. Saarinen traveled to the Philadelphia Zoo to lens the hippo. Human riders were digitally composited on the backs of animals that cannot be ridden, such as giraffes and elands. Stripes were applied to Arabian horses so that they resembled zebras. The lion and the tiger had to be filmed at Cougar Hill Ranch, Little Rock, Calif.—"They would be bothered by all the smells on the back lot," noted Saarinen—but on their backs are real riders. Digital Domain’s team brought together the various images to produce the final scenes of all the animals together on city streets.
In order to maintain consistent lighting during multiple takes spread over several days, Saarinen had 6,000-square-foot custom-made tarps suspended over the studio back lot, and used artificial light to illuminate the streets. The tarps were then digitally removed from the shots in post.
After all the animal scenes were wrapped, Saarinen went to Chicago to capture the cityscapes. The Chicago buildings were later used to replace and augment the buildings on the Paramount back lot. "We made the back lot look bigger than it was," related Digital Domain visual effects supervisor Paul Kirsch. "We added buildings and built side streets so as you look down the road, it appears to go on for miles."
"The message of this commercial is that there is a new car in the world: the Fiat Punto," said Leo Burnett creative director Enrico Dorizza. "The car sets a new standard of style." Dorizza said the spot shows something "absolutely unusual as naturally real and believable. It had to seem like a normal day with traffic; animals had to behave like cars and still be natural."
In addition to Dorizza, the creative ensemble at Leo Burnett consisted of copywriter Licia Martella, art director Anotonio Cortesi and head of production Antonello Filosa.
Plum’s support team was comprised of executive producer Chuck Sloan, producer Line Postmyr and production supervisor Leanne Amos. Also providing production support was Milan house Harold S.r.I., with credits going to executive producers Daniela Cattaneo and Valter Buccino and producer Silivia Cattaneo.
Digital Domain’s contingent included Kirsch; director of commercial production Gabby Gourrier-Evans; senior VP, commercial production Ed Ulbrich; producer Amy Wixson; compositors Jean-Luc Azzis, Katie Nook, Scott Rader and Pete Jopling; rotoscope artists Laura McDermott, Byron Werner, Joe Mandia and Ido Gondelman; and production coordinator Mary Loibl.
"Animals" was cut by Paul Kelly and Steward Greenwald of BUG Editorial, New York, and Harold S.r.I., Milan, respectively. Colorist was Mike Pethel of Company 3, Santa Monica. The audio post was completed by engineer/mixer Marco Dinotello of Mach 2, Milan.
Leo Burnett licensed Harry Connick, Jr.’s "A Wink and a Smile," from the soundtrack to Sleepless In Seattle, for the spot.
