By Christine Champagne
Undeterred by neighborhood bullies, a little girl builds the rocket ship that she believes will take her to the North Pole to see Santa Claus in “The Aviator,” an inspiring two-minute cinema spot for JCPenney created by Saatchi & Saatchi, New York, and directed by Fredrik Bond of bicoastal/international MJZ. Skeptical performer “Real Love”
“I thought it would be nice to find that kind of world that you lived in when you were at the age where you could do anything, and any day could take you on an adventure. That’s the kind of thing that we wanted to capture,” Bond reflected, noting, “It was a lovely brief from the agency. They really wanted something inspirational for the Christmas holiday without being too product oriented, so, for me, it was a dream project.”
“Actually, this is the most product-oriented film I’ve ever done,” Bond qualified. “But you would never really know.” That’s because clothing and other items from JCPenney were part of the fabric of the film without being obvious.
JCPenney was comfortable making a purely brand spot like “The Aviator” because Saatchi also created other more overtly merchandise-driven spots for the client to run during the holiday season, offering “a balanced package,” noted Saatchi Executive Creative Director Kerry Keenan, who crafted the campaign with exec creative director Michael Long, copywriter Sara Rose and art director Lea Ladera.
Bond was in Iceland when he wrote the treatment for “The Aviator.” “Iceland was just filled with these lovely little kids. They all have these rosy cheeks. So, in my treatment, I only had Icelandic-looking children. I think the agency and the client came back to me and said, ‘Is this taking place in Iceland?’ ” Bond shared.
The director suggested and ultimately got the go ahead to shoot the spot in Vancouver, B.C. “Vancouver isn’t a typical Christmas setting,” Keenan remarked, “and we liked the idea that it was more of a temperate place.” Vancouver made sense to Bond in that it is “the outdoor capital of the world. People are used to being outside doing stuff, building stuff, and I wanted to find a location that would support the world of our little girl,” Bond said, “and, hopefully, find somebody there [to play her].”
While casting sessions were held in Vancouver, the child featured in the spot–a charming six-year-old actress named Amanda Gryniewski–was discovered during another casting call in Toronto. “This girl just blew us away,” Bond said. “She was incredibly honest and an extremely truthful little character.”
In fact, Gryniewski wasn’t shy about telling the director that she didn’t necessarily believe in the premise of the commercial. “She was extremely unimpressed with the story,” Bond said with a laugh. “When we finally showed her the space rocket she was going to fly in, she just shook her head and said, ‘That’s so ridiculous. That’s nothing like a real space rocket.’ “
Turns out the kid ought to know. “Her father works for the space shuttle program,” the director revealed.
Despite her skepticism, Gryniewski was able to slip into character and proved to be a natural, soulful performer. “She never felt like she was being puppeteered. She did her thing, but she took direction extremely well,” Bond praised.
Bond and DP Alwin Kuchler shot “The Aviator” on 35mm over the course of three days, and the biggest challenge was creating a look that wasn’t too picture perfect, according to the director. Once everything was captured on film, Bond spent a week and a half with Russell Icke, an editor at The Whitehouse, assembling a first cut. They were quickly able to make a crucial decision. “We had actually planned for the rocket to take off right at the end, and we had a rough animation of the rocket flying into the sky,” Bond said. “But when we saw the cut, we realized it was so much stronger when you just imagine its going up in the air–so that was a great thing.”
Bond and Icke’s first cut was just over two minutes, by the way, then the creative team shaved it down to two minutes and showed it to the client despite the fact that a 2:00 spot wasn’t in the original plan. JCPenney was impressed and decided to buy cinema time to showcase the 2:00 commercial; and :60 and :30 versions were then cut for television as originally plotted.
Finding music to accompany the visuals wasn’t easy. The creative team had its collective heart set on a track at the outset of the editing process but decided against it after learning the song was being used on an Australian tourism ad. After listening to about 500 songs, Rose came upon John Lennon’s wonderfully simple “Real Love,” and the creative team loved it. But no one was convinced they would be able to secure the rights–let alone afford them. Still, they tried, and to their delight, they succeeded–Yoko Ono gave the spot her personal stamp of approval–and paid what Keenan described as a “surprisingly affordable” rate.
Asked why the song complements the spot so well, Rose mused, “I think because it is a demo, [Lennon] recorded it in a way that’s very real. It’s not overproduced, and it’s very simple, and everything in this film felt real and authentic and not overproduced.”
“I think that the beautiful thing about seeing the cut the first time was how utterly believable it is,” Keenan agreed. “Though it is a commercial, and it could be seen as kind of sappy, nobody is taking it that way because they absolutely feel that it is real.”
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