8 Mainstream Directors Who Moonlight As Commercial Directors

8. Wes Anderson

wes-anderson Let us start with Wes Anderson. I was very surprised that at how frequently Wes directs commercials. Not that I doubted his versatility. I just found it hard to believe that the CEO of a company,when asked to brainstorm about directors for their advertising campaign, would think of Wes Anderson. His work isn't exactly burning up the box office. You would think a big company would look to someone like Micheal Bay or Brett Ratner with their box office success and wide exposure, but that is simply not the case. Whether your company wants a commercial made to help sell cheap hipster furniture, over priced phone service, or crappy cars, it seems like Wes Anderson is the guy for you. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CCL-vhEtf4 First up is a Wes Anderson-directed ad for Ikea. It may not be easy to notice Anderson's style at first, but it's there if you look close enough. Remember the fake fire alarm scene off The Royal Tenebaums? That little bit of hand held lunacy is often forgotten by people who consider Wes to be a tripod using middle-of-the-screen director. You shouldn't be so quick to judge. As this commercial illustrates, Mr. Anderson has the ability to let loose and get experimental with his camera. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2zn-8KAiro It's easy to see Anderson at work in this spot he directed for AT&T. Of course you can recognize his style in the way the camera moves; it's very reminiscent of Anderson's classic style, especially the "Let me tell you about my boat" scene from The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou. Still, it's not a case of Wes repeating himself. He flipped the script and varied his typical tracking shot. In Life Aquatic, the camera moved through the ship as both the characters and the backgrounds stayed static waiting for their showcase. In the AT&T commercial, it's only the back ground that moves; the main character stays in the static position. So there! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tw-Qu2BzfNA Car commercials are usually pretty standard fare. You shoot a couple of slick shots of a car cutting tight corners and the driver using some nice features and you're done. The only time a car commercial gets really extraordinary is when the Superbowl rolls around. Other than that, most car commercials are pretty standard. Enter Wes Anderson's car commercial. It's almost as if Wes hired the Max Fischer Players to direct a real life drama about family anxiety that just happened to be an advert for a Hyundai. Brilliant. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0u0oEUcasU We should not leave out Wes' foreign work. Although it isn't the main focus of the list, it is worth noting that many mainstream directors have made commercials for big brand products overseas. Wes Anderson is no exception. Behold his fairly recent advert for a Japanese cell phone company called SoftBank, made with a very old-looking, paycheck-grabbing Brad Pitt. It's classic Anderson style (whip pans galore) and it features, if I do say so myself, one of the finest performances of Brad Pitt's career. Directors take note:Brad Pitt saying dialogue doesn't work. Keep it silent. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spCknVcaSHg And then of course, there is the famous Wes Anderson American Express commercial. Simply amazing. I can honestly say it's better than most feature films I've seen in the last 2 years.
 
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Raymond Woods is too busy watching movies to give you a decent bio. If he wasn't too busy watching movies and reading books about movies and listening to podcasts about movies, this is what he'd tell you. "I know more about film than you. Accept this as a fact and we might be able to talk."