If you haven’t gotten in touch with your inner Fast, a new spot for the Volkswagen GTI called “Hair” just might inspire you to do so.
The work of Miami-based Crispin Porter + Bogusky (CP+B), the :30 is one in a campaign of four spots featuring Fast, a modernized version of the old Rabbit icon that represented the GTI back in the day when the car was known as the Rabbit. Darker than the softer Rabbit that came before him, Fast, with rabbit-like features including strong haunches, appears in the form of a short, squat, slightly sinister looking character with a black body and a red mouth.
Ultimately, Fast comes to inhabit all of those who drive the GTI, existing not only as a physical icon but also within them.
In “Hair,” for example, a girl and a guy are driving down a highway in a GTI with the windows rolled down. While the guy is clearly enjoying the drive, the girl looks uncomfortable as her hair whips about her face. Finally, she asks her boyfriend if he can roll the windows up a bit. He tells her no as politely as possible (he wants the windows down so he can enjoy the roar of the car’s engine) while his inner Fast rages. “Sometimes,” an ominous voice from within the guy (and unheard by the girl) says, “my Fast doesn’t get along with my girlfriend.”
The spot concludes by urging drivers to make friends with their Fast.
As for the other spots in the campaign, “Cop” finds a driver pulled over by a policeman and being polite while his inner Fast rebels. In “Streamlined,” a driver refuses to let his girlfriend accompany him on an errand run because his Fast wants to travel light, and in “Rain,” a guy orders Indian food via phone but says no to having it delivered, opting to get in his GTI and pick it up himself despite rainy weather, because his Fast “thinks delivery is for the weak.”
FAST AND FURIOUS
According to CP+B executive creative director Andrew Keller, “The GTI represents the most masculine and performance-driven end of the Volkswagen brand, so we wanted to take advantage of that and engage the enthusiast with this notion of Fast.”
The Fast spots are decidedly darker and more twisted than the lighter Volkswagen fare that came out of Boston’s Arnold Worldwide, the agency that previously handled the account. “This car presents an opportunity to explore an edge that Volkswagen hasn’t really explored before,” Keller explained.
With a lot riding on the project, CP+B chose to assign the task of directing its first campaign for Volkswagen to director Rocky Morton of bicoastal/international MJZ. Explaining the decision to put Morton in the driver’s seat, CP+B creative director Rob Strasberg said, “We had worked with Rocky on the Subservient Chicken campaign [for Burger King], and he definitely has a dark side and a sort of fiendish sense [that we needed for this campaign].”
Morton also impressed CP+B with his enthusiasm for the project and the Fast character in particular. “He was passionate about how he was going to bring Fast to life. Being an inanimate object, you had to find ways to give a little life to it through lighting and shooting, and he really grasped that,” Strasberg praised. “In each of the spots, there is a different lighting trick.”
Morton and DP Sal Totino shot “Hair” on location in Los Angeles, with actors Derek Cater and Anjuli Cain seated in a GTI that was towed down a highway by a shooting truck. It was a rainy day, with only occasional bursts of sun, so the car was covered with a tarp, and additional lights were employed to create the illusion of sunlight. Fans were used to simulate wind given that the car wasn’t really speeding down the highway.
The shoot went well, Keller reported, noting that Cain was a good sport given the fact that she really did have to endure a whipping by the wind.
Once the shoot wrapped, editor Tom Scherma of Cosmo Street Editorial, New York, cut the spot.
While the edit was relatively straightforward, the process of creating a voice for the Fast was more complicated. The agency could have hired a voiceover artist to be the voice of the Fast in all of the spots, but it was decided it would be best to have each actor featured in the spots, including “Hair,” do the voice himself, with some manipulation in post, of course.
The roar of the GTI’s engine is also a key element in the spot. “We really wanted the sound of the car to be the fourth character in the spot,” Strasberg said. “That was a huge challenge, and that is why there is no music [in the spot].”
The sound design for not only “Hair” but the entire Fast campaign was completed at Beacon Street Studios, Venice, Calif., with John Nau and Andrew Feltenstein serving as composers and Brian Chapman as sound designer. One of the most important elements of the sound design track was the hypnotic Fast theme. “You’ll hear the monkish type chants when Fast appears. That was John Nau, my partner, and I sighing again and again and again to make it feel as if a group of monks is meditating,” Feltenstein explained.
Additionally, the visual effects artisans at R!OT Manhattan worked on the project, helping to enhance the appearance of Fast.
From the very beginning, there was another huge challenge that presented itself during the creative process–what would Fast look like? The agency took its cues from both the original Rabbit icon and the look of the modern-day GTI. For example, the GTI has a distinctive red line across the front of the grill–that same shape can be seen in the slim red mouth of Fast.
The Fast was actually designed at CP+B. “It was one of our first in-house design projects. We actually created this thing from the ground up,” said Strasberg, adding “we had a prototype in 48 hours for the [client] presentation.”
Obviously, Volkswagen took to the Fast, and apparently, GTI enthusiasts are also enamored with the icon, which is being given out at Volkswagen dealerships to GTI buyers. In fact, as of press time, Fasts put up on eBay for auction were going for more than $300 each.
