Ground Zero, a Los Angeles agency, bought the distribution rights to Pinky Vodka, a Swedish brand, and began promoting it around Valentine’s Day with a viral video, Cupid, that transforms the arrow slinger myth with a brand related message–since ladies are in love with Pinky Vodka, Cupid’s job is a lot more difficult. The video was produced by Savant Film.
“Fifty-five percent of the market is women, but there aren’t many products geared toward them,” said Court Crandall, executive creative director at Ground Zero. “We launched it around Valentine’s Day so we thought it would be funny to look at Cupid’s life and portray him not as a relaxed cherubic guy, but under duress because he has competition in the market. He has to work harder and faster, like Willy Loman.”
The video is a first person account of Cupid, played by Michael Serrato, who is shown shooting arrows in his golden days before he proclaims, “Today, it’s totally unmanageable because women everywhere are falling in love with Pinky Vodka.” Brief scenes of women drinking Pinky Vodka in a bar follow before Cupid is shown walking the streets, determined to work harder before he returns to his workshop and orders his grandpa to make more arrows.
Carolyn Chen, who directed the video for Savant, said it was lensed in late January in Los Angeles. The indoor scenes were shot in a machine shop to produce “an office, blue collar workday vibe,” and the outdoor scenes were shot in Los Feliz, a trendy area of L.A.
“We created the character and devised some Rube Goldberg devices, like a Gatling gun, a turreted gun he used to shoot arrows,” she said. The next scene shows Cupid in the sky, firing more arrows. “We flew him overhead on some wires and used a special stunt unit that raised him up on a forklift with flying harness wires that we removed in post,” she said.
The one minute thirty-eight second film was shot during one day with a 35mm Arri cam light camera. When asked why a digital camera wasn’t used, Chen said, “All my work is done in film, so it was never considered.”
Chen praised Serrato, who was found through a detailed casting call. “We went to a lot of comedy shops in L.A. and independent comedy troupes and dug deep for someone who could play Cupid. We got a great response.”
She said the goal was “not to make it look like a broad comedy but an intimate portrait of Cupid, which helped the comedy. If we’d tried to be funny with the filmmaking it wouldn’t have been as sweet and intimate.” Crandall said Chen “understood comedy and how to make the product look beautiful in an upscale way.”
The film plays at http://www.pinkyvodka.com and YouTube. Crandall said it was also distributed to an email list of 118,000 women called Billion Dollar Babes.
Michelle Satter To Be Honored At Sundance Film Festival Gala
The nonprofit Sundance Institute today announced details for the 2025 Sundance Film Festival’s gala fundraiser, Celebrating Sundance Institute, which will take place on Friday, January 24, 2025 at the Grand Hyatt Deer Valley in Utah. The event will be an evening in celebration of Michelle Satter, founding sr. director of artist programs at Sundance Institute, for her longstanding commitment to nurturing artists and cultivating independent film through the Sundance Labs, where visionary artists convene to develop groundbreaking projects through an in-depth creative process, for the past four decades. The annual Vanguard Awards will be presented during the evening to Sean Wang, writer and director of Dìdi, and Julian Brave NoiseCat and Emily Kassie, co-directors of Sugarcane, who premiered their films at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival.
The annual gala enables the nonprofit to raise funds to support independent artists year-round through labs, grants, and public programming that nurture artists from all over the world. The 2025 event is made possible with the generous support of Google TV. The Festival will take place from January 23–February 2, 2025, in person in Park City and Salt Lake City, with a selection of titles available online from January 30–February 2, 2025 for audiences across the country to discover bold independent storytelling.
“For over four decades Michelle has been devoted to truly championing independent storytellers,” said Amanda Kelso, acting CEO of Sundance Institute. “She has encouraged artists to own their voice, learn their craft, become fierce leaders, and develop their resilience in our changing ecosystem. Her life-long commitment to supporting artists, especially in underrepresented... Read More