Director Noam Murro, Boston-based Modernista! and Santa Monica visual effects shop Method Studios have delivered a spectacular new spot called “Monsters” (:60), which tells the story of the birth of the Hummer H3. Turns out–at least according to this commercial–that the vehicle was born out of a romance between a 130-foot tall lizard-like monster and an equally humongous robot. As we see in the spot, the two meet and fall in love while ravaging Tokyo. Before long, the lizard-like creature is pregnant with the robot’s child. When their baby is born, we see it is a bright red Hummer H3 that–like its proud parents–is capable of tearing through Tokyo.
The aim of “Monsters” is to convince drivers that while the Hummer H3 is a smaller version of the original Hummer, it is still a real Hummer with the same capabilities, according to Modernista! co-founder/executive creative director/copywriter Lance Jensen, who noted, “There is a fear [among drivers] that the Hummer H3 is going to just look like a Hummer but not behave like one.”
Hardly your typical auto spot, “Monsters” is a wildly imaginative epic. “There are easy solutions, and there are harder ones,” Jensen mused, “and sometimes it is more fun for you as a group to try to do something different and move the category forward.”
Murro was certainly impressed by the concept. “I’ve never seen anything quite like it,” the director remarked. According to Jensen, Murro actually contacted the agency after he heard about the project through the grapevine and said he wanted to write a treatment. “He was super passionate about this spot. He was like, ‘I’m doing this spot,’ ” Jensen shared.
The creative team at Modernista!, which also included co-founder/executive creative director/art director Gary Koepke, senior art director Philip Bannery and senior copywriter Alex Flint, was thrilled that a director of Murro’s caliber would be interested in the project, and after seeing the treatment that the director wrote, the job was his. What exactly was Murro’s vision? “He wanted to play it really straight and make it about two ‘people’ falling in love and having a baby. He wanted to go right for the emotional heart and not get technique-y with it as far as making it look like an old movie,” Jensen said.
MONSTER MASH
With the concept and tone of “Monsters” nailed down, Murro collaborated with the artisans at Method Studios to come up with the best way to bring the spot to life. It was a complicated job that ultimately combined elements ranging from actors in costume to plates shot in Tokyo to miniatures to CG.
The first stop of the process, however, was for Method Studios–with the help of Venice, Calif.-based Pixel Liberation Front–to create a full previsualization of the spot. “That’s where we established all of our scenes. We were basically creating the equivalent of dailies and giving them to the editor [Avi Oron of Bikini Edit, New York] so that he could work with Noam in the edit to build a story,” explained Method Studios lead 2-D artist/visual effects supervisor Alex Frisch.
Upon completion of the previs, a small crew traveled to Tokyo to shoot background plates, setting out to capture the city from the point of view of the monsters. “Before stepping foot in Tokyo, we already had an approved spot in the computer,” Frisch said, referring to the previs. “That really helped us to know exactly what we were looking for. We followed very carefully the plan we had in the previs.”
Murro and DP Toby Irwin then shot actors wearing costumes created by Stan Winston Studio, Van Nuys, Calif., onstage amidst miniatures in front of a green screen at Universal Studios Stages, Universal City, Calif. Everything had to be precisely at twenty-fourth scale.
“I’ve never been on a shoot where I’ve seen so many people walking around with laptops,” Jensen commented. As for what Murro was like on the set, Jensen said, “He’s got a really good command of what he wants to happen. When he thought the monster didn’t look pregnant enough, he was like, ‘No, you’ve got to re-do this. You’ve got to re-do that.’ He’s very tough, but he never made anybody feel bad. I said, ‘I could learn something from this guy because he was able to give constructive criticism without destroying people’s egos.’ “
Once the shoot wrapped, the crew at Method Studios got to work on the effects, compositing the plates and creating CG elements, including everything from buildings to debris to monster footprints, to enhance the live action.
One might assume that selecting the music to accompany the spot would have been the easiest part of the process, but it was actually “a huge struggle,” Jensen said. “We went back to the well about six or seven times on this thing. Everybody had to be happy.”
In the end, the song “Love Is Strange” by Everything But the Girl was chosen. “It’s one of those songs that satisfies a lot of creative buttons without being too obvious,” Jensen pointed out.
Looking back on the making of “Monsters,” Jensen reflected that producing the spot was akin to giving birth. How so? “It took nine months to make this,” Jensen revealed.
While the client loved the concept, “Monsters” was frankly a huge undertaking in terms of cost, and the spot was almost killed a few times, according to Jensen. But the agency lobbied–clearly successfully–to save the spot. “We knew it was too great not to do,” Jensen said.