Creative director
Carmichael Lynch, Minneapolis
1) 2017 was the year of women. Free the bid was a huge part of that. Agencies are looking beyond the typical male “A-list” directors thus exposing new talent with diverse points of view. Audi’s 2017 Super Bowl spot was a prime example. The bid included a lesser known Aoife McArdle alongside powerhouses Lance Acord and Martin deThurah. She brought an emotional performance-based treatment and a point of view that felt the most honest for the spot. It was incredibly well-received and I’ve been seeing her name more and more.
4) I’m wondering if there will be a backlash to the overproduced, “cinematic” look of 2017. As the need for original content continues to explode across media channels and production budgets continue to get sliced and diced, I think we may see more content that relies on wit and whimsy over high production. On that note, I’m hoping to see brands having a bit more fun in 2018. Humor would be a welcome change after a year of cause marketing and politically-charged messages. While I love that brands are getting involved and becoming a part of important conversations, it’s not for everyone. It’d be nice to take ourselves a bit less seriously and have more fun.
Review: Writer-Director Andrea Arnold’s “Bird”
"Is it too real for ya?" blares in the background of Andrea Arnold's latest film, "Bird," a 12-year-old Bailey (Nykiya Adams) rides with her shirtless, tattoo-covered dad, Bug (Barry Keoghan), on his electric scooter past scenes of poverty in working-class Kent.
The song's question — courtesy of the Irish post-punk band Fontains D.C. — is an acute one for "Bird." Arnold's films ( "American Honey," "Fish Tank") are rigorous in their gritty naturalism. Her fiction films — this is her first in eight years — tend toward bleak, hand-held verité in rough-and-tumble real-world locations. Her last film, "Cow," documented a mother cow separated from her calf on a dairy farm.
Arnold specializes in capturing souls, human and otherwise, in soulless environments. A dream of something more is tantalizing just out of reach. In "American Honey," peace comes to Star (Sasha Lane) only when she submerges underwater.
In "Bird," though, this sense of otherworldly possibility is made flesh, or at least feathery. After a confusing night, Bailey awakens in a field where she encounters a strange figure in a skirt ( Franz Rogowski ) who arrives, like Mary Poppins, with a gust a wind. His name, he says, is Bird. He has a soft sweetness that doesn't otherwise exist in Bailey's hardscrabble and chaotic life.
She's skeptical of him at first, but he keeps lurking about, hovering gull-like on rooftops. He cranes his neck now and again like he's watching out for Bailey. And he does watch out for her, helping Bailey through a hard coming of age: the abusive boyfriend (James Nelson-Joyce) of her mother (Jasmine Jobson); her half brother (Jason Buda) slipping into vigilante violence; her father marrying a new girlfriend.
The introduction of surrealism has... Read More