Amir Farhang, who’s best known for his work as a copywriter at BBH New York, Crispin Porter+Bogusky and 180 Los Angeles, has formally moved into the director’s chair, joining Hollywood-based Über Content for U.S. commercial representation.
Farhang has already made a directing splash with his series of humorous Bolthouse Farms/Baby Carrots spots in the continuing “Eat ‘Em Like Junk Food” campaign from Crispin Porter+Bogusky, Boulder, Colo. The Farhang-helmed commercials centered on the musings of an offbeat grocery store employee, who is at times paired with a fellow worker in various antics. The Baby Carrots package was produced by Prettybird. While the job was run through that production house, Farhang was not on its roster. Über Content is his first production house roost as a director after years of working on the agency side where he had a hand in creating noted work for clients such as Axe (Gamekillers), Vaseline (“Sea of Skin”) and adidas (Basketball is a Brotherhood).
Farhang also wrote and creative directed The Sony Rocket Project, a 22-minute documentary that aired earlier this month (10/8) on the Discovery Channel. The documentary grew out of a Sony campaign from 180 Los Angeles in which eight academically gifted high school students teamed with an aerospace expert in using Sony VAIO laptop computers to help design, build and launch a 29-foot tall, 1,100 pound rocket into the stratosphere. A Sony VAIO Z-series laptop with Intel Core i5 Processors was built into the inner chamber of the rocket to run key on-board functions while the VAIO F-Series 16.4″ screen, Intel Core i7 Processor with Turbo Boost served as mission control for the launch. Not only did the kids successfully propel the rocket into space, the project has attracted worldwide interest with some 30 high schools in the U.S. and around the world wanting to replicate the program. The campaign components, including a short film as well as the aforementioned documentary, were directed by Andrew Fried of @radical.media.
“I’ve been extremely lucky to have worked with some of the best agencies in the world,” said Farhang. “That moment when you go into production has always been the most exciting part of the job for me and the move into directing has always in the back of my mind. I am extremely grateful that the opportunity with Über came to fruition.”
Preston Lee, Über Content partner/executive producer, related, “Amir gets that the ‘idea is king’ as much or better than most people in advertising. His pedigree as a top creative is clearly impressive, but his drive to turn great ideas into great little films is what really excited us.”
Martin Scorsese On “The Saints,” Faith In Filmmaking and His Next Movie
When Martin Scorsese was a child growing up in New York's Little Italy, he would gaze up at the figures he saw around St. Patrick's Old Cathedral. "Who are these people? What is a saint?" Scorsese recalls. "The minute I walk out the door of the cathedral and I don't see any saints. I saw people trying to behave well within a world that was very primal and oppressed by organized crime. As a child, you wonder about the saints: Are they human?" For decades, Scorsese has pondered a project dedicated to the saints. Now, he's finally realized it in "Martin Scorsese Presents: The Saints," an eight-part docudrama series debuting Sunday on Fox Nation, the streaming service from Fox News Media. The one-hour episodes, written by Kent Jones and directed by Elizabeth Chomko, each chronicle a saint: Joan of Arc, Francis of Assisi, John the Baptist, Thomas Becket, Mary Magdalene, Moses the Black, Sebastian and Maximillian Kolbe. Joan of Arc kicks off the series on Sunday, with three weekly installments to follow; the last four will stream closer to Easter next year. In naturalistic reenactments followed by brief Scorsese-led discussions with experts, "The Saints" emphasizes that, yes, the saints were very human. They were flawed, imperfect people, which, to Scorsese, only heightens their great sacrifices and gestures of compassion. The Polish priest Kolbe, for example, helped spread antisemitism before, during WWII, sheltering Jews and, ultimately, volunteering to die in the place of a man who had been condemned at Auschwitz. Scorsese, who turns 82 on Sunday, recently met for an interview not long after returning from a trip to his grandfather's hometown in Sicily. He was made an honorary citizen and the experience was still lingering in his mind. Remarks have... Read More