CEO
Publicis Communications North America
1) In 2016 data showed up for work. From our strategic teams to our creative departments, data found a seat at the table and its voice in the room. Surprisingly, when properly applied, it felt human, insightful and a welcome contributor to the creative process.
2) Our clients sent a very clear message this year to strip away our organizational complexity and focus on ideas capable of transforming their businesses and brands. For us this meant breaking down the silos and tapping into the most diverse talent we have to offer, regardless of where it resides in our organization. Being liberated to work together, across agency brands and disciplines has fundamentally changed our work environment and ignited possibility.
3) Our Super Bowl work for T-Mobile this year lit up the social channels. It connected and was shared, over and over. It embodied the Un-carrier mission, took on the category leaders and reaffirmed their advocacy for consumers in a broken business. I’m guessing it also ruined the big game for some of our competitors. As a Canadian I was pleased to see that it also made noise north of the border.
4) Agencies need to become “makers.” The demand for content, in all forms, has become a strategic imperative in our clients’ determination to be cultural relevant and current. Continuing to outsource all production will inadvertently welcome “frenemies” and compromise our position as brand stewards. Production partnerships must be formalized and an appropriate percentage, internalized.
Jennifer Kent On Why Her Feature Directing Debut, “The Babadook,” Continues To Haunt Us
"The Babadook," when it was released 10 years ago, didn't seem to portend a cultural sensation.
It was the first film by a little-known Australian filmmaker, Jennifer Kent. It had that strange name. On opening weekend, it played in two theaters.
But with time, the long shadows of "The Babadook" continued to envelop moviegoers. Its rerelease this weekend in theaters, a decade later, is less of a reminder of a sleeper 2014 indie hit than it is a chance to revisit a horror milestone that continues to cast a dark spell.
Not many small-budget, first-feature films can be fairly said to have shifted cinema but Kent's directorial debut may be one of them. It was at the nexus of that much-debated term "elevated horror." But regardless of that label, it helped kicked off a wave of challenging, filmmaker-driven genre movies like "It Follows," "Get Out" and "Hereditary."
Kent, 55, has watched all of this — and those many "Babadook" memes — unfold over the years with a mix of elation and confusion. Her film was inspired in part by the death of her father, and its horror elements likewise arise out of the suppression of emotions. A single mother (Essie Davis) is struggling with raising her young son (Noah Wiseman) years after the tragic death of her husband. A figure from a pop-up children's book begins to appear. As things grow more intense, his name is drawn out in three chilling syllables — "Bah-Bah-Doooook" — an incantation of unprocessed grief.
Kent recently spoke from her native Australia to reflect on the origins and continuing life of "The Babadook."
Q: Given that you didn't set out to in any way "change" horror, how have you regarded the unique afterlife of "The... Read More