If you’ve ever parked on a steep hill and forgot to put on the parking brake, had an unfortunate run-in with your garage door, or lost your grip on that air conditioner you were foolishly installing in a living room window by yourself, you can’t help but relate to the poor saps in “Humans.”
The new :60 created by Boston’s Hill Holliday for Liberty Mutual finds people making really stupid mistakes that cause serious damage to their cars and their homes and likely their egos, too.
The scenarios staged by Dayton/Faris–the directing duo of Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris who work out of bicoastal Bob Industries–are heartbreakingly funny, and the humor is amplified by the use of the 1980s hit “Human,” recorded by Human League. It really is the perfect song to underscore our frailties.
“The campaign was constructed around the line, ‘Humans are imperfect creatures living in a beautifully imperfect world,’ with the Human League playing in the background,” according to Hill Holliday SVP/group creative director/copywriter Dave Banta, who noted, “We toyed with the idea of remaking the song, but the original arrangement is so iconic that we couldn’t bring ourselves to change it.”
Accident coverage While the song choice was a no brainer, Hill Holliday’s creative team brainstormed for months and trolled the news and the Internet looking for accidents–involving both cars and homes–that could be portrayed in the spot.
“We wanted to make sure we showed mistakes and not irresponsibility,” stressed Kevin Daley, Hill Holliday senior VP/group creative director/art director.
The hope is that people will walk away from seeing this spot realizing that no matter what precautions you take, accidents do happen, and you need to protect yourself with insurance from Liberty Mutual. “Liberty Mutual understands the customers are trying to do the right thing out in the world, but for one reason or another, they don’t always succeed,” Daley said. “That’s why you need a responsible insurance company in your corner when stuff happens because it’s bound to.”
Dayton/Faris accepted the assignment because they were drawn to the humorous approach taken to make Liberty Mutual’s point. That said, the duo didn’t want to go overboard with the humor. They told SHOOT that they wanted to find subtle ways to increase the visceral quality of each accident without making any of them cartoonish. They were also interested in mining the interpersonal dynamics between the people in the spot. What do you say to your neighbor after you’ve just destroyed his car?
In the end, Dayton/Faris was able to make the scenarios relatable but not generic, Daley praised. “We also wanted each scene to be a little story unto itself,” Daley said. “Dayton/Faris brought that sensibility to the project and were able to create characters that the viewer has empathy for.”
The footage for “Human” and other spots in the campaign was shot in seven days on location in both Los Angeles and Portland, Ore. as well as on the Paramount Studios and Universal Studios backlots in Hollywood. On a job like this, half the battle was logistical. Dayton/Faris looked for ways to stage things as close together as possible, getting the most out of their stunt team. There were also issues of public safety, so they shot some of the potentially dangerous stunts on the aforementioned backlots.
Cars took the brunt of the damage on the shoot–a driver’s side door was torn off of one vehicle, an air conditioner crashed through the roof of a car, and errant golf balls smashed the windows of another car to pieces. Given that for most of the scenarios the directors only had one car to work with, they had to get the shot on the first take most of the time.
The directors recalled feeling at times like they were shooting an episode of Jackass.
RED POVs DP Neil Shapiro shot with the RED, which allowed Dayton/Faris the option of running multiple cameras to capture certain scenes from various angles and shooting some scenes in slow motion.
As for the edit, the client had signed off on a :60 version of the spot upfront, so editor Hank Corwin of bicoastal Lost Planet was able to work nearly every scenario shot into the launch spot. The footage that wasn’t used will likely find its way into other spots.
Both Banta and Daley are thrilled with the reaction to “Humans.” “People seem to really connect with it. With so many scenarios, there is always one that either someone has done themselves, or had a friend do,” Daley said. “We get a lot of comments from folks who said they laughed out loud when they first watched the spot, which is wonderful and rare.”
