Canon’s “Inspired” is marked by a whimsical spirit that is a departure from the sophisticated visual fare often associated with director Nicolai Fuglsig of MJZ. Yet it represents a deft, well taken detour as the spot for Grey New York last month won the primetime commercial Emmy Award. It’s an honor that has increased in its relevance to the ad industry in recent years as the entertainment quotient has become all the more essential with viewers having more control than ever over what they watch, being able to fast forward past or eliminate ads altogether–unless there’s something engaging and captivating that merits their attention.
Seeing “Inspired” garner the Emmy alongside the other assorted deserving program winners was especially gratifying for Fuglsig given the state of television today. He noted that TV is in a golden age of sorts with great writing and creative opportunities attracting stellar filmmaking and acting talent, To have the Cannon spot recognized in this year’s distinguished field of honorees is “pretty special,” he said.
Fuglsig added that the Emmy win was also special because it topped a field of inspired work that consisted of Grey Poupon’s “The Chase” directed by Bryan Buckley of Hungry Man for Crispin Porter+Bogusky, Google Chrome’s “Jess Time” helmed by Nanette Burstein of Hungry Man for Google’s Creative Lab, and Nike’s “Jogger” directed by Lance Acord of Park Pictures for Wieden+Kennedy.
Canon’s “Inspired” also broke a run of four straight years that Wieden+Kennedy won the spot Emmy Award.
“Inspired” depicts the lengths people will go in order to take a special photograph. A man leans precariously over the side of a home’s snowy rooftop, with camera in hand to capture a scene we cannot see. A woman frantically flees from a fast charging giraffe yet still manages to get off some shots of the animal with a camera held at different awkward angles. A guy shoots seafood on ice at an outdoor Chinese market only to be shooed away by the proprietor. A man climbs a huge reef with camera at the ready.
A mom looks to snap the perfect shot of her daughter blowing out the candles on her birthday cake. Another man finds himself running helter skelter away from swarming bats who were presumably riled up when his flash lit up their dwelling. A guy has his head nearly submerged in a lake but holds his camera up high enough to get a shot of something or someone out of our view. A man has a badly scraped knee, a wound evidently suffered while trying to get his camera someplace it shouldn’t have been. And a young gent with skates on his feet and a skateboard under his back swoops down a steep street to follow a tire on fire rolling down the thoroughfare.
A super then appears on screen which simply reads: “Long live imagination.”
All these earnest photographers are introduced to us with the musical accompaniment of a specially arranged rendition of the song “Beautiful Dreamer” as vocalized by Rachel Fannan of Only You. Her performance also is the aural backdrop to a series of still photos we next see that were lensed in action by these photographers who dared to pursue their dream shots. It turns out, for example, that the man on the snowy rooftop was shooting a friend luxuriating in a backyard pool surrounded by snow and ice.
A voiceover concludes, “What will you imagine with the new Rebel EOS T4i from Canon?”
“I used to be a photographer, a photojournalist myself so I’ve been in situations where I have gone extra crazy lengths to get the right shot,” said Fuglsig whose cinematographer on “Inspired” was Linus Sandgren. “You do that as a director as well–go whatever lengths are necessary. As far as this job was concerned, though, at first we were planning more complex scenes and scenarios. But then we toned it down to more along the lines of what the home-based photographer would try to achieve in their neighborhoods, in their everyday lives or while on holiday.”
Fuglsig conjectured that this “everyday” approach was one that viewers could relate to, helping the spot to resonate with the public and perhaps ultimately with TV Academy voters.
John Leverence, sr. VP of awards at the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, described the Canon commercial as simply an inspiring, clever, entertaining homage to photographers and their quest to get the shot. He also praised “Inspiring” for its nuanced, subtle touches.
“The first scene was very clever where the man is up on his roof and taking a picture of someone below,” related Leverence. “There’s snow on the roof yet behind him are all these Southern California palm trees–a nice little touch, underscoring that with that camera you go to unusual places. Getting the photo puts you in an inspired netherworld.”
2nd career nomination “The whimsical kind of humor in this spot is different from what I’m known for–which is more visually intricate, cool, kind of darkly tinged work,” acknowledged Fuglsig.
Yet one could make the case that when Fuglsig injects a dash of whimsy into his work, TV Academy voters are most responsive as his two career primetime Emmy Award nominations would attest–the other coming back in 2008 for Coca-Cola’s “It’s Mine” out of Wieden+Kennedy, Portland, Ore.
A Super Bowl spot, “It’s Mine” culminated with a Charlie Brown balloon at Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade coming out of nowhere to grab a Coca-Cola bottle balloon that Underdog and Stewie balloons were vying for in the breathtaking stratosphere over Manhattan. “It’s Mine” earned plaudits as one of that year’s best Super Bowl commercials.
Still, Fuglsig’s non-whimsical work has also scored its share of honors, the most notable coming in 2008 when he won the Directors Guild of America (DGA) Award on the basis of such visually complex fare as Guinness’ “Tipping Point” and Motorola’s “Journey,” both for Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO, London.
The third spot in his DGA-winning entry, though, had a dash of whimsy–JCPenney’s “It’s Magic” out of Saatchi & Saatchi New York.
Fast forward to today and Fuglsig has recently wrapped another Guinness spot for Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO. Also upcoming is a major high-profile piece introducing the new Corvette Stingray, which will be on the heels of a Fuglsig-helmed commercial for Nike.
This flurry of activity marks his return to the ad arena after a hiatus during which Fuglsig worked on writing and further developing a feature project, DMZ, described by the director as “a new conflict sci-fi” drama.
After that movie, Fuglsig has another feature in the hopper via Fox. But he affirmed that his plans include maintaining his long-standing connection to commercialmaking and branded content.
