Courageous Persuaders
By Robert Goldrich
This week’s feature on the Kangaroo Project puts the spotlight on a two-pronged competition, now in its fifth year, that annually turns out a PSA which not only addresses a socially worthwhile issue but also gains significant exposure through guaranteed airtime. In the process, up-and-coming creative and directorial talent is uncovered.
Cut from the same progressive cloth is the Courageous Persuaders student advertising competition, which is in its sixth year in Michigan. However, this marks the first year that the program has gone national. It encourages high school students to create a 30-second TV spot that warns middle school students about the dangers of drinking alcohol.
Judge Michael A. Martone, whose opposition to underage drinking led to his founding the Courageous Decision Program, teamed with McCann Erickson Detroit to present students with $12,000 in scholarship funds at the Courageous Persuaders banquet earlier this month.
The competition drew entries from some 10,000 students from across the country. This year’s winning spots can be viewed at www.couragefirst.com, with the grand prize ad appearing on national television.
Creators of the following commercials received scholarships and Courage Award trophies:
- Grand prize, $3,000–“2 Minutes” by Karon Youngkin, Gil Zabarsky, Bryan Hogan, Misty Mueller and James Salligs of J.J. Pearce High School in Richardson, Tex.
- First place, $1,500–“Consequences” by Tanner Arrington and Andrew Smith of Cooper High School in Abilene, Tex.
- Second place, $1,000–“Bad Influence” by Daniel Phillip Maggio, Ryan Maggio and Fahad Naeem of West Valley High School in Hemet, Calif.
- Third place, $500–“Spin the Bottle” by Danny Belkin of Thomas S. Wooton High School in Rockville, Md.
Additionally, four special awards were presented:
- The Adcrafter Award ($2,000 funded by the Adcraft Club of Detroit) went to a spot deemed to convey factual info about the dangers of alcohol use in the most persuasive and creative manner. The PSA was “Vocabulary 101” by James Semivan of Dondero High School in Royal Oak, Mich.
- New York festivals Award ($2,000) was chosen based on the spot’s effectiveness to inform and inspire. The winner was “Drunken Drummer” by Jessica Wiswary, Nick Kyewski, Shelby Johnson and Kyle Ellis of Eppier Junior High School in Utica, Mich.
- USA Today Award ($2,000) was chosen by the USA Today Detroit staff from among the most persuasive students as judged by middle school pupils. Belkin’s “Spin the Bottle” took this honor.
- And the USA Today Courageous Leader Award was presented to a special teacher, Dick Rockwell of Royal Oak’s Dondero High School, for his extraordinary contribution to the Courageous Persuaders program.
Winners were selected through several rounds of judging. During round one, a panel of ad professionals from McCann Erickson and board members of Courage First viewed the entries and identified the leading contenders. Those entries were then reviewed by middle school students who completed questionnaires developed by McCann to measure which ideas were the most persuasive. Those results determined the winners.
“The results revealed the incredible impact of the commercials,” stated Courageous Persuaders co-founder John Barczyk, senior VP/group account director at McCann Detroit. “After a single viewing of the winning commercials, middle school students exhibited nearly 30 percent greater sensitivity. These are numbers any marketer would be proud of.”Review: Writer-Director Andrea Arnold’s “Bird”
"Is it too real for ya?" blares in the background of Andrea Arnold's latest film, "Bird," a 12-year-old Bailey (Nykiya Adams) rides with her shirtless, tattoo-covered dad, Bug (Barry Keoghan), on his electric scooter past scenes of poverty in working-class Kent.
The song's question — courtesy of the Irish post-punk band Fontains D.C. — is an acute one for "Bird." Arnold's films ( "American Honey," "Fish Tank") are rigorous in their gritty naturalism. Her fiction films — this is her first in eight years — tend toward bleak, hand-held verité in rough-and-tumble real-world locations. Her last film, "Cow," documented a mother cow separated from her calf on a dairy farm.
Arnold specializes in capturing souls, human and otherwise, in soulless environments. A dream of something more is tantalizing just out of reach. In "American Honey," peace comes to Star (Sasha Lane) only when she submerges underwater.
In "Bird," though, this sense of otherworldly possibility is made flesh, or at least feathery. After a confusing night, Bailey awakens in a field where she encounters a strange figure in a skirt ( Franz Rogowski ) who arrives, like Mary Poppins, with a gust a wind. His name, he says, is Bird. He has a soft sweetness that doesn't otherwise exist in Bailey's hardscrabble and chaotic life.
She's skeptical of him at first, but he keeps lurking about, hovering gull-like on rooftops. He cranes his neck now and again like he's watching out for Bailey. And he does watch out for her, helping Bailey through a hard coming of age: the abusive boyfriend (James Nelson-Joyce) of her mother (Jasmine Jobson); her half brother (Jason Buda) slipping into vigilante violence; her father marrying a new girlfriend.
The introduction of surrealism has... Read More