Newly signed BRW USA, Los Angeles helmer Mark Palansky tears ‘huddled masses’ from the mundane in an artful :60, “Your Liberation” for Fiat out of GlobalHue, Detroit. The spot, which premiered at the L.A. Auto Show, features people far and wide embracing their dynamic individualism. “Your Liberation” is Palansky’s first-ever commercial, coming to the spot world from features that include Penelope (Christina Ricci, James McAvoy, Reese Witherspoon). The spot recently debuted during the Golden Globes telecast.
“Your Liberation” opens on a man waking in bed, followed by the man feeding an infant morning milk. A voiceover begins, reciting a revised version of the famed sonnet mounted inside the Statue of Liberty, “The New Colossus,” “Give me your tired, your fed up, your bored to death huddled masses.” We see shots of people at work, parties and even locked inside a computer, sleepwalking through life.
The voiceover continues, “Yearning to breathe free, yearning to break free. Yearning for so much more.” We smash-cut to shot of a Fiat 500 racing though the city and countryside. More voiceover declares, “Give me your new days full of promise and hope and new possibilities. Days faraway from the bonds of sameness– give me your liberation and I will return the favor.” Invigorated people painting, office cubicles covered in forest wallpaper and Fiat passengers flying kites from the 500 follow. The Fiat logo and tag “Simply more” close out the spot.
A NEW SPY IN TOWN SPY, a FotoKem company offering creative finishing services for commercials and feature films, has opened a new studio in Santa Monica, Calif. SPY: LA extends the capabilities of its main facility in San Francisco, and will specialize in VFX-based commercial productions. SPY: LA has already taken on a number of visually driven spots for such clients as UPS, Asics, THQ/UFC, Hillshire Farm and Canon. The new West Coast locale is within FotoKem’s award-winning sound studio Margarita Mix.
Visual effects artist Scott Rader also joins SPY: LA as creative director and lead Flame artist. He previously worked at top VFX studios such as Radium, Hydraulx and Digital Domain. Rader’s work on numerous television series, feature films, commercials and music videos as an Inferno artist/VFX supervisor has earned him nine Emmys, three Clio Awards, three PromaxBDA Awards and a VES Award.
SPY co-founder Eric Hanson noted the two studios are connected by a high speed network offering real-time interface between San Francisco and Santa Monica. FotoKem sr. VP Rand Gladden added, “There is synergy and scalability for our clients in the aggregation of solutions provided by SPY and Margarita Mix. The flexibility of SPY’s interconnected locations and FotoKem’s Burbank headquarters offers a wide range of artistic and technical support.”
PEOPLE IN THE NEWS… NY-based post boutique Northern Lights, along with sister companies Bodega, Mr. Wonderful, and SuperExploder, have added Marta Stajek as director of business & operations. She had been freelancing as a sr. content business manager and director of business affairs after stepping down from her post as VP/director, business affairs at Digitas….CRASH+SUES, the Minneapolis-based VFX, animation, color correction and editing company, has signed EP Sven Shelgren. He has worked for such directors as Jim Johnston, John Pytka, Peter Kagan, and Paul Dektor, and for production companies including Dektor Film, Jon Francis Films, and Stiefel & Co….
