A silly joke calls our attention to a serious health issue in this PSA directed by Tim Abshire of Backyard, Venice, Calif.
We open on two dorky guys, both a bit overweight, standing in a residential driveway. One is holding a large oddly shaped hunk of concrete. He asks his cohort, “Do you know what this is?”
“No” is the response.
The first guy then proceeds to clunk the other man in the head with the concrete.
The impact elicits a relatively quiet “Ow” from the bewildered victim, who rubs his head.
A supered message relates the simple truth, “What you don’t know can hurt you.”
This is followed by a serious super, which reads, “Learn more about the link between obesity and heart disease.”
An end tag logo for the American Obesity Task Force (AOTF) then appears on screen, accompanied by a Web site address, obesityrisk.org. The Web site takes visitors to links about diet, scientific research and other info that can help reduce weight and cholesterol.
The PSA’s creative silliness is heightened by a live-action approach akin to cartoon-like violence. Getting clocked by a hunk of concrete that hard and big should normally have resulted in considerable pain, if not an outright concussion and/or the victim being knocked unconscious. Instead the guy lets out a rather subdued, matter-of-fact “Ow,” and tends to the “injury” by merely rubbing the side of his head.
Freelancer Lisa Leone served as creative director on “Ow.”
Director Abshire was backed by a Backyard support team that included executive producer Kris Mathur and producer Kyra Shelgren. The DP was Peter Selesnick.
Editor was John Dingfield of Cutters, Chicago. Colorist was Craig Leffel of Optimus, Chicago. Audio post mixer was Ben Keller of Another Country, Chicago.
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Cinematographer Lol Crawley, BSC and production designer Judy Becker collaborated for the first time on The Brutalist (A24) and emerged as Oscar nominees in their respectiveย disciplines. Their work on the film has also earned major recognition elsewhere on the industry awards circuit. Just this week, Crawley won the British Society of Cinematographersโ Feature Film Award. He also is currently a nominee for both an ASC Award and a BAFTA Film Award. And Becker received nominations for a BAFTA Film Award and an Art Directors Guild (ADG) Excellence in Production Design Award. Crawley and Becker, though, traversed distinctly different paths to The Brutalist, being on opposite ends of the collaborative continuum with director and co-writer Brady Corbet going into the film. Crawley had already shot two features for Corbet prior to The Brutalist--The Childhood of a Leader (2015) and Vox Lux (2018). In sharp contrast, The Brutalist marked Beckerโs first time working with Corbet. Becker recalled seeing The Childhood of a Leader and immediately wanting to design for Corbet. Describing herself as โstunnedโ by the film, she related that it reflected Corbetโs talent as a filmmaker, his ability to work within a budget on a period movie and still deliver an end product that looked fantastic while brilliantly telling a story. Becker noted that a big budget period film replete with tons of set dressing, over-dressed locations and the like misses the mark for her. She asked, โWhy waste that money?โ But when Becker sees a period movie with a pared down budget that looks so good, โIโm really blown away.โ Based on The Childhood of a Leader, Becker told her agent that sheโd love to... Read More