Director Matt Smukler of Los Angeles-based HELLO! stirs up grade school nostalgia in the :60, “The Ropes,” for Kraft Foods/Oreo out of Draftfcb, NY. The spot opens on an eager young student timidly walking down the hallway of his new school. Cut to an older, more seasoned student, who notices the cautious classmate and swiftly comes to his aid. He zips the boy’s open backpack, saving him from a potentially embarrassing blunder and making him a little more comfortable in his new surroundings. Cut to the new student sitting on an empty stairwell tying his sneakers as class is just about to get out. We then see a hand usher the boy off the stairwell by his backpack handle, saving him from the impending stampede of students rushing off to their next class.
Cut to the cafeteria, where the young student is eating his lunch alone at a long table. As he sets out to savor his dessert, he realizes that he is unable to dip his Oreo cookie in the small opening of his milk carton. The resident expert sweeps in once again and pulls the tabs of the carton open to allow ample dipping room for his Oreo. As he is finishing his first cookie, the boy spots another struggling student across the cafeteria and rushes over to open his milk, thus completing the cycle of valuable school lessons. The spot finishes on a shot of the cafeteria with the Oreo logo and the super, “Milk’s favorite cookie.”
Editor was Jim Ulbrich of Beast Editorial, Santa Monica. DP was Tami Reiker.
NASA ASTRONOMER TO ADDRESS VES SUMMIT Dr. Rich Terrile, NASA astronomer, will be the featured speaker at the Visual Effects Society (VES) Production Summit 2010 on Oct. 23. Dr. Terrile is the director of the Center for Evolutionary Computation and Automated Design at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He will provide his POV on how the future of evolutionary computation and artificial intelligence will impact the entertainment industry. Dr. Terrile is also a science and technical consultant for films, television, corporate and financial customers including work with Academy Award®-winning directors James Cameron and Steven Soderbergh. Several science shows including this year’s Discovery Science Channel series Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman, in addition to Destination Mars and “The Astronomers–Prospecting for Planets, have featured Dr. Terrile and his work.
The Production Summit 2010 is a one-day event at the Ritz Carlton Hotel, Marina del Rey, Calif., that will bring together filmmakers, technologists, visual effects leaders and practitioners from all crafts to look at how the industry might evolve over the next five years and how to stay relevant in this time of immense change.
PEOPLE IN THE NEWS
Rob Bagot has joined San Francisco-based Eleven in the new position of group creative director, expanding the creative footprint at the independent advertising and integrated marketing shop. Bagot joins from McCann Worldgroup in San Francisco where he was chief creative officer since 2005….Pereira & O’Dell, San Francisco, has hired Nick Chapman as director of strategy to oversee the strategic planning direction across the agency’s roster of clients from strategy to implementation. He comes over from Venables Bell and Partners where he was brand strategy director for all ConAgra brands (Orville Redenbacher’s, Slim Jim and Chef Boyardee), VIZIO and HBO in addition to projects for such clients as Audi, Barclays and 24 Hour Fitness….
