Before I get to the AD OF THE WEEK/MONTH/WHATEVER, I need to get something off my chest about the box office gorilla, Titanic.
If you think I'm going to bore you with the myth :they could have fit on the door but Rose just wouldn’t share," then think again. It's been proven (somehow) that they could not fit. I mean Jack tried to get on the door and it started to sink because they were too heavy. Pretty much that's the end of that discussion.
What I wanted rail on is that when Rose dies at the end of the movie, she goes to that shiny Titanic in the heavens and meets Jack at the top of the staircase. How furious do you thing Rose's husband is while he waits for her at the Pearly Gates?
I mean, this lady has a wild, one-night stand with Jack and she's going to meet him at the end of her long, selfish life?
Did everyone forget that she was married and had a bunch of kids with this husband?
Did the writers forget?
She was married for decades for goodness sakes! To a good man it seemed. A man that Rose was using so she could ride horses, jump in planes, and pose for boudoir pictures.
Rose shouldn't be going to see Jack on that fresh shiny staircase. She should be going to see her husband. And right there you realize that Rose DeWitt Bukater might be the most selfish character in the history of film.
Let's draw the line even further. Kate Winslet's Young Rose was someone I would have loved to hang with in a post-Prohibition USA. Filled with moxie, highly educated, and quite adventurous. I imagine her to be quite the wingwoman as well.
It's Gloria Stuart's Old Rose that I take issue with here.
Old Rose set the stage with helping us forget. In the last few minutes of the movie, we see all of those pictures on Old Rose’s night table. Are they pictures of her family? Maybe a wedding pic? How about those cute grandkids Jack foretold as he was getting ready to die in that freezing water?
Nope. Just her. And what about that necklace.
Yeah, I get that your douchebag fiancé gave you that Heart of the Ocean necklace (aka Le Cœur de la Mer) and even though he's dead now, you really want to keep sticking it to him by throwing it overboard, but for goodness sakes, that Louis XVI diamond is worth $250 million.
Maybe it's just me that had to scrub toilets to pay a bar tab in 1990 when my original wingwoman went home with my date and my wallets, but $250 million is a truckload of cash. Oh Old Rose. Think about all of the people you could have helped by selling that gem off at Sotheby's and creating the Old Rose DeWitt Bukater Foundation. Maybe, just maybe, chucking a priceless necklace off the side of the search boat is a bit irrational.
Did I say priceless? What I meant was two hundred million dollars! Which brings us why you where asked to come aboard Mr. Lovett's private funded ship in the first place...
No, it was because of your emotional voice-cracking Titanic testimonials. The sole reason you were invited by Mr. Lovett was that he found out that scandalous drawing of a lady wearing the Heart of the Ocean was you.
Yes, he happily invited you aboard his boat, and why not? His life's work was spent studying the Titanic and developing the needed technology to explore the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean and find this precious gem. Surely you knew this going in Old Rose, didn't you?
Now that I've gotten that off my chest...
AD OF THE WEEK/MONTH/WHATEVER
"Gorilla" - 1970
Company: American Tourister
Ad agency: DDB/Doyle Dane Bernbach
DDB (Doyle Dane Bernbach) specialized in self-effacing styled advertisements in the late 1960s / early 1970s. The geniuses at this firm brought this style to America Tourister, mocking nearly all aspects of the consumer culture.
Before the "Gorilla" spot, DDB put the American Tourister through the rigors of life, showcasing the product's resistance to accidents, clumsiness, and malicious intent. The long running campaign provided ample real estate to render more realistic instances of a consumer's life. People ran over American Touristers in cars and were dropped from airplanes. DDB took full aim at the beloved advertising icons of yesteryear, lampooning the compliant porter, the admiring butler and the Philip Morris bellboy.
The 30-second spot entirely of a gorilla (actually a man in a $20,000 ape suit) in a zoo cage, slamming an American Tourister suitcase against the bars, walls, and ceiling -- all while the stereotypical 1970s deep-voiced male voiceover calmly and sarcastically assured us that the product could withstand the beating without worry:
One could (and should credit) DDB for American Tourister's continued growth through the seventies. By the time the "Gorilla" commercial was winning awards, the company was one of the most popular manufacturers of mid-priced luggage in the United States. A general industry upswing in the 1970s helped the firm rise to a new peak in sales. Luggage owners replaced cases at a more rapid rate and leisure travel in general was on the rise. These trends and the company's entrance into the growing market for business cases helped the company achieve record sales.
The Gorillas of the Ad World
Bill Bernbach and Ned Doyle worked together at Grey Advertising in New York, where Bernbach was Creative Director. In 1949, they teamed up with Mac Dane, who was running a tiny agency, and together they started Doyle Dane Bernbach in Manhattan. Dane ran the administrative and promotional aspects of the business; Doyle had a client focus and Bernbach played an integral role in the writing of advertising, serving as the creative engine of the agency.
The agency's first ads were for Ohrbach's department store and they typified the new "soft-sell" approach using catchy slogans and witty humour in contrast to the repetition and hard-sell advertising that was in vogue until then. The new agency was initially successful in winning business for clients with small budgets. As of 2013, DDB has had the Volkswagen account since 1959. Their campaigns for Volkswagen throughout the 1950s and 1960s were said to have revolutionized advertising. Notable campaigns included the 1959 Think Small series of Volkswagen advertisements, which was voted the No. 1 campaign of all time in Advertising Age’s 1999 The Century of Advertising. In 1960, the agency won the account of Avis, then the number-two auto rental company. The tongue-in-cheek approach, "We Try Harder Because We're Number 2," was a major success (and remains part of the company's slogan today: "We Try Harder"). The DDB "Daisy" ad is considered a significant factor in Lyndon B. Johnson's defeat of Barry Goldwater in the 1964 presidential election and landed Maxwell Dane on the infamous Nixon's Enemies List. 1972's Little Mikey commercial for Quaker Oats ran continuously in the U.S for twelve years.
A branch office was opened in Los Angeles in 1954. In 1961, DDB opened its first international office in West Germany to service Volkswagen. Significant growth came in the mid-sixties after the firm signed Mobil Oil and the available budgets grew materially. Offices in London and other European locations were opened. Bernbach was appointed Chairman and Chief Executive Officer in 1968 when the agency was publicly listed; he became Chairman of the Executive Committee in 1976.
The impact of Doyle Dane Bernbach's creativity on advertising around the world, and the history of management crises that led to merger in 1986, are detailed in the book Nobody's Perfect: Bill Bernbach and the Golden Age of Advertising. Written by journalist Doris Willens, who served as DDB's Director of Public Relations for 18 years, the book is based on oral histories and interviews with the three founders, the line of the agency's presidents, and key creative and account people. By 1986, four years after Bernbach's death, the agency group had worldwide billings of USD $1.67B, 54 offices in 19 countries, and 3,400 employees, but showed profits declining 30% on the prior year.
If you think I'm going to bore you with the myth :they could have fit on the door but Rose just wouldn’t share," then think again. It's been proven (somehow) that they could not fit. I mean Jack tried to get on the door and it started to sink because they were too heavy. Pretty much that's the end of that discussion.
 |
| Any pictures of those grandkids? Nope! |
I mean, this lady has a wild, one-night stand with Jack and she's going to meet him at the end of her long, selfish life?
Did everyone forget that she was married and had a bunch of kids with this husband?
Did the writers forget?
She was married for decades for goodness sakes! To a good man it seemed. A man that Rose was using so she could ride horses, jump in planes, and pose for boudoir pictures.
Rose shouldn't be going to see Jack on that fresh shiny staircase. She should be going to see her husband. And right there you realize that Rose DeWitt Bukater might be the most selfish character in the history of film.
Let's draw the line even further. Kate Winslet's Young Rose was someone I would have loved to hang with in a post-Prohibition USA. Filled with moxie, highly educated, and quite adventurous. I imagine her to be quite the wingwoman as well.
It's Gloria Stuart's Old Rose that I take issue with here.
 |
| Old Rose is the villain you missed the first time you watched! |
Nope. Just her. And what about that necklace.
Yeah, I get that your douchebag fiancé gave you that Heart of the Ocean necklace (aka Le Cœur de la Mer) and even though he's dead now, you really want to keep sticking it to him by throwing it overboard, but for goodness sakes, that Louis XVI diamond is worth $250 million.
Maybe it's just me that had to scrub toilets to pay a bar tab in 1990 when my original wingwoman went home with my date and my wallets, but $250 million is a truckload of cash. Oh Old Rose. Think about all of the people you could have helped by selling that gem off at Sotheby's and creating the Old Rose DeWitt Bukater Foundation. Maybe, just maybe, chucking a priceless necklace off the side of the search boat is a bit irrational.
Did I say priceless? What I meant was two hundred million dollars! Which brings us why you where asked to come aboard Mr. Lovett's private funded ship in the first place...
No, it was because of your emotional voice-cracking Titanic testimonials. The sole reason you were invited by Mr. Lovett was that he found out that scandalous drawing of a lady wearing the Heart of the Ocean was you.
Yes, he happily invited you aboard his boat, and why not? His life's work was spent studying the Titanic and developing the needed technology to explore the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean and find this precious gem. Surely you knew this going in Old Rose, didn't you?
Now that I've gotten that off my chest...
AD OF THE WEEK/MONTH/WHATEVER
"Gorilla" - 1970
Company: American Tourister
Ad agency: DDB/Doyle Dane Bernbach
DDB (Doyle Dane Bernbach) specialized in self-effacing styled advertisements in the late 1960s / early 1970s. The geniuses at this firm brought this style to America Tourister, mocking nearly all aspects of the consumer culture.
Before the "Gorilla" spot, DDB put the American Tourister through the rigors of life, showcasing the product's resistance to accidents, clumsiness, and malicious intent. The long running campaign provided ample real estate to render more realistic instances of a consumer's life. People ran over American Touristers in cars and were dropped from airplanes. DDB took full aim at the beloved advertising icons of yesteryear, lampooning the compliant porter, the admiring butler and the Philip Morris bellboy.
The 30-second spot entirely of a gorilla (actually a man in a $20,000 ape suit) in a zoo cage, slamming an American Tourister suitcase against the bars, walls, and ceiling -- all while the stereotypical 1970s deep-voiced male voiceover calmly and sarcastically assured us that the product could withstand the beating without worry:
Dear clumsy bellboys,
brutal cab drivers,
careless doormen,
ruthless porters,
savage baggage masters,
and all butter-fingered luggage handlers all over the world
have we got a suitcase for you
One could (and should credit) DDB for American Tourister's continued growth through the seventies. By the time the "Gorilla" commercial was winning awards, the company was one of the most popular manufacturers of mid-priced luggage in the United States. A general industry upswing in the 1970s helped the firm rise to a new peak in sales. Luggage owners replaced cases at a more rapid rate and leisure travel in general was on the rise. These trends and the company's entrance into the growing market for business cases helped the company achieve record sales.
The Gorillas of the Ad World
Bill Bernbach and Ned Doyle worked together at Grey Advertising in New York, where Bernbach was Creative Director. In 1949, they teamed up with Mac Dane, who was running a tiny agency, and together they started Doyle Dane Bernbach in Manhattan. Dane ran the administrative and promotional aspects of the business; Doyle had a client focus and Bernbach played an integral role in the writing of advertising, serving as the creative engine of the agency.
The agency's first ads were for Ohrbach's department store and they typified the new "soft-sell" approach using catchy slogans and witty humour in contrast to the repetition and hard-sell advertising that was in vogue until then. The new agency was initially successful in winning business for clients with small budgets. As of 2013, DDB has had the Volkswagen account since 1959. Their campaigns for Volkswagen throughout the 1950s and 1960s were said to have revolutionized advertising. Notable campaigns included the 1959 Think Small series of Volkswagen advertisements, which was voted the No. 1 campaign of all time in Advertising Age’s 1999 The Century of Advertising. In 1960, the agency won the account of Avis, then the number-two auto rental company. The tongue-in-cheek approach, "We Try Harder Because We're Number 2," was a major success (and remains part of the company's slogan today: "We Try Harder"). The DDB "Daisy" ad is considered a significant factor in Lyndon B. Johnson's defeat of Barry Goldwater in the 1964 presidential election and landed Maxwell Dane on the infamous Nixon's Enemies List. 1972's Little Mikey commercial for Quaker Oats ran continuously in the U.S for twelve years.
A branch office was opened in Los Angeles in 1954. In 1961, DDB opened its first international office in West Germany to service Volkswagen. Significant growth came in the mid-sixties after the firm signed Mobil Oil and the available budgets grew materially. Offices in London and other European locations were opened. Bernbach was appointed Chairman and Chief Executive Officer in 1968 when the agency was publicly listed; he became Chairman of the Executive Committee in 1976.
The impact of Doyle Dane Bernbach's creativity on advertising around the world, and the history of management crises that led to merger in 1986, are detailed in the book Nobody's Perfect: Bill Bernbach and the Golden Age of Advertising. Written by journalist Doris Willens, who served as DDB's Director of Public Relations for 18 years, the book is based on oral histories and interviews with the three founders, the line of the agency's presidents, and key creative and account people. By 1986, four years after Bernbach's death, the agency group had worldwide billings of USD $1.67B, 54 offices in 19 countries, and 3,400 employees, but showed profits declining 30% on the prior year.
