Directors Steve Beck and Peter Gornstein, CG/visual effects supervisor and artist Ivo Horvat, and line/VFX producer Kathy Tishler have teamed to form Saboteur, a live-action/effects collective that has come aboard the directorial roster of Passport Films, a Santa Monica shop headed by owners/executive producers Patti and David Coulter.
Beck’s directing chops span features and commercials. On the former front, he helmed the movies Ghost Ship and 13 Ghosts. Earlier in his career, Beck served as the visual effects art director on Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, The Abyss and The Hunt for Red October.
Beck’s prior spotmaking roost in the U.S. was Rhythm+Hues, where he meshed live action with VFX and CGI. Beck has to his credit several Super Bowl commercials over the years, including Nissan’s “Pigeons” for TBWAChiatDay, Los Angeles, Primestar’s “Runaway Pipe” via now defunct Adler Boschetto Peebles, and Pontiac Grand Prix’s “Coyote” for the former DMB&B Detroit. His spot endeavors span such clients as Volkswagen, McDonald’s, Chevrolet, Gatorade and First Union Bank.
For the latter, which was out of Publicis & Hal Riney, San Francisco, Beck directed “Launch,” “Noise” and “Cityscape” which swept the visual effects category and earned a production design honor at the AICP Show. Beck helmed the campaign through the since closed commercial production arm of Industrial Light+Magic where he also turned out such work as Gatorade Fierce’s “Raptor vs. Raptor,” a SHOOT Top Spot, for what was then known as FCB Chicago.
Over the years, Beck-directed commercials have gained recognition at the AICP Show, the Clio Awards, Cannes, the London International Awards, the Siggraph Electronic Theatre, and the International Automotive Advertising Awards. Recently Beck had been active in the international commercialmaking market, turning out projects in Italy, Spain, Turkey, Dubai and Russia.
He has also collaborated with freelance producer Tishler regularly over the past decade, and developed a working rapport with Gornstein and Horvat in recent years, laying the groundwork for them to now come together as Saboteur, an L.A.-based collective.
The only Saboteur member not currently in Southern California is Gornstein who’s in Denmark. But he plans to relocate to L.A. later this year. Gornstein has been a concept artist on numerous features, including Contact, Stuart Little, Anaconda, DieHard 3, Snow Falling on Cedars and James And The Giant Peach for Sony Pictures Imageworks. He’s also served as lead concept developer for IO interactive on several video games. This conceptual and technical expertise has supported his visual storytelling as a director. He was a nominee for Best Young Director at Cannes in ’04. He made an initial splash directorially with the short film Sunrise (winner of a Fuji Film international short film award, Fotokem and Panavision awards). Gornstein’s short Peaceforce was honored with the Canal+Prix Award at the short film festival Clermont Ferrand and is currently making its way through the festival circuit this summer slated to gain exposure at fests in London and Sao Paulo.
At press time, Gornstein was wrapping a Danish commercial for Aalborg Airport. He is currently in development on two feature film projects, one titled On Thin Ice with NDS New Danish Screen, the talent development division of the Danish Film Institute, and Misofilm. The action thriller is set at the North Pole.
Horvat has worked at a variety of industry stalwarts such as Industrial Light + Magic, Sony Imageworks, Imaginary Forces, Uncharted Territory and Zoic Studios. His artistry in conceptual design, matte painting and visual effect supervision is on display in 60-plus feature films, commercials, and most recently the aforementioned short film Peaceforce. His contributions can be seen in 2012, Star Wars: Episode One, The Mummy Returns, Galaxy Quest, Superman Returns, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, Spiderman, and The Chronicles of Narnia to name a few. While heading up the matte painting department at Sony Imageworks, he devised a camera projection system created by Maxon for Cinema 4D, which has since become a VFX industry standard.
Tishler brings 20 years of production experience to Saboteur and Passport. Her spotmaking exploits span VFX, automotive, comedy, beauty, tabletop, kids and celebs. She plans to also work on the business development front for Saboteur.
Saboteur will team with Passport on pre-pro, production and post, offering clients a streamlined process and tapping into other talent and resources that the collective’s members have forged relationships with over the years.
Effie UK and Ipsos Report Concludes Marketing Industry Should Do Its Part To Heal Societal Divisions
Society has never been more divided, according to a new report Healing the Divide in which Effie UK and brand and advertising experts from Ipsos explored brands’ role in shaping society and healing societal divisions.
The report details how instability, inflation, and COVID recovery —the convergence of multiple interconnected crises around the world that coincide with and amplify each other, causing hard to resolve systemic challenges, have become the norm over the past few years. As a result, the use of division as a weapon is now a major theme in today’s culture and politics, and sadly 47% of the UK and 49% of the US agree with the statement that “Within my lifetime, society in my country will break down,” according to Ipsos Global Trends 2024.
While some brands have tried to respond to this, the report finds responsible marketing is now threatened by weaponized division. It points to the World Federation of Advertisers’ decision to shut down the Global Alliance for Responsible Media following an antitrust lawsuit filed by Elon Musk’s X, combined with DEI rollbacks, as significant setbacks.
The report says these setbacks underline the importance of marketing in solving collective problems, such as climate change, food security, and harmful online content. It also points to a need for marketers to take more interest in and more responsibility for healing divisions.
Research claims marketers are ideally placed to build and rebuild the antidote to division (trust, empathy, a sense of control, connection and collaboration). According to the Ipsos Veracity index of trusted professionals, society is becoming more trustworthy of advertising executives. Additionally, 57% of Britons agree that brands should communicate their... Read More