June 29, 2006
June 28, 2006
The Eighties
Jump Cut, History of the American Cinema, Chicken Little, Stacey Peralta
In trying to uncover the causal forces that have affected us with co-branded advertising, I have encountered a variety of "The Eighties" narratives, as "The Eighties" pertains to the film industry, films and filmmakers, and film history generally. These narratives can by and large be divided into three distinct camps: (1) claiming films of "The Eighties" generally reflect the decade's ideology, as manifest in the Reagan presidency and correlative rise of the religious right, (2) claims that such ideological linkages are overstated, and that true change occurred not in the content of films, but in their means of production, distribution, etc., and (3) there were no significant changes.
The first group is best represented by journal articles published concurrent with "The Eighties" decade: articles critical of Indiana Jones or Star Wars, et al., appear most prominently online in the archives of the excellent journal of contemporary media studies, Jump Cut. These articles among others published in the decade attempted to establish a critical context for immediate reception of a film that then loomed incomparably large in whatever historico-cultural context the authors found themselves. As such, the tone of these articles sometimes approaches Chicken Little proportions, though actual "sky is falling" claims are few and far between, and the articles are basically on point.
With just a decade's distance from "The Eighties," historical counter-narratives have already begun to appear, most prominently in the form of Stephen Prince's recent contribution to the multi-volume History of the American Cinema edited by Charles Harpole. Prince's volume 10, A New Pot of Gold, takes issue with any conflation of "Reaganism" and Hollywood film. He even goes so far as to chastise those who would place the business of film in "The Eighties" under the long shadow cast by an undeniable dominance of Lucas-Spielberg narratives throughout the decade. This approach means questions of ideology, politics and the like inevitably take a back seat to the "true" driver of Hollywood's rocky road: expanding synergies of ancillary markets, studios' absorption into mass media conglomerates, a "radical" shift away from the theater and into the home.
The third approach, recognizing continuity throughout the history of film in lieu of "That Was The Day Everything Changed Forever" (i.e. Stacey Peralta) narration, is one I like, though I am not a huge fan of its biggest proponent, David Bordwell. Bordwell masterfully elucidates various continuities of narration in visual storytelling from the earliest studio practices to the present day; yet his adamant refusal to consider any interpretation more complex than a remedial analysis of plot and history means he glowingly endorses brilliant plot points from Die Hard to Jerry Maguire, without acknowledging the not-so-insignificant fact that nearly every one of these narratives centers on a heroic white male protagonist. The implications seem obvious, and well within the bounds of responsible interpretation.
Ultimately, then, I am finding that significantly more has been published on "The Eighties" than I had previously imagined. Film and media scholars seem all too eager to "narrativize" the decade, to such a degree that we already have coterminous, counter-, and counter-counter-narratives to choose from. This makes my task more difficult, and as well casts a pall over my entire project, which could not possibly be more contemporary.
June 26, 2006
Quotable Pototables, David Bordwell Speaks
Most books analyzing contemporary Hollywood focus on changing subjects and themes, such as the representation of gender, ethnic groups, or cultural attitudes. The results are typically exercises in interpretation, taking films as "texts" to be deciphered. By contrast, this book emphasizes the craft of storytelling. In the spirit of reverse engineering, I want to tease apart the finished films and see what strategies of plot and visual style govern their design. We still lack knowledge of how Hollywood's "ever-vigorous tradition" tells stories in a distinctive way, so my main goal is to expose some central constructional principles of contemporary moviemaking. When we've grasped those principles, we will be in a better position to track both local and long-term changes in the ways movies work.David Bordwell
The Way Hollywood Tells It
I for one am hard pressed to find the distinction between "teasing apart" and "interpreting." As well I am not so sure about Bordwell's insistence that we "lack knowledge" of how Hollywood stories are told in a distinctive way. We have now been screening films as a culture for over 100 years, and Bordwell's own work inevitably contradicts his premise, by revealing consistencies of narrative construction over the entirety of Hollywood studio history. While I appreciate the remedial work he has done in analyzing the history of film narrative--and he has seen literally every movie ever made--his claim here is incredibly reductive. And, of course, he is opposed to "interpretation" focused on gender, race and class, while conveniently refiguring his own interpretation as a "teasing apart," "reverse engineering," "exposing," etc.
Quotable Potables, # 2
These dynamics partly explain why television is so widely perceived as a postmodernist medium, or at least as a medium that contributes to the postmodernist condition, and why, within this context, intertextuality functions as a powerful vehicle of commodity formation. In this process, the newly emerging subject comes to perceive himself or herself as a gendered commodity around which a whole commercial nexus is organized--just like Garfield, the Muppet Babies, and other TV personalities with whom the child is led to identify. Further, the child comes to believe that this nexus is activated and extended whenever he or she consumes a product. In short, television teaches viewers that commercial interactivity empowers precocious consumers by enabling them to assimilate the world as they buy into the system.Marsha Kinder
Playing with Power in Movies, Television and Video Games
Quotable Potables, Vol. 1
At the ideological level, the goal [of cinema] is to reinforce the unified subject as an intermediate step in reproducing a certain social world. This is not the definitive work of television. Its function is more directly linked to consumption, which it promotes by shattering the imaginary possibility over and over, repeatedly reopening the gap of desire.Beverle Houston
"Viewing Television: The Metapsychology of Endless Consumption"
June 17, 2006
Adam's Important Trip
Adam Forkner, Yum! Brands, Inc., Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Administration Quarterly (pdf), Richard Florida
Last night I was contacted by Adam Forkner, the Portland, OR-based music and video artist. Being as it was very late in the evening, and as Adam had yet to eat a proper meal, I was asked to suggest (demand?) specific things for Adam to eat. Of course, as I have been thinking continuously about co-branding, co-branded products, and awards for the co-branding of co-branded products over the past several months, Yum! Brands, Inc. immediately came to mind.
Founded in 1997 as TRICON Global Restaurants, Inc., the consortium of quick-service restaurants (QSRs) we now know as Yum! first emerged as a brand itself in 2002. Yum! Brands, Inc. is now the world's largest restaurant company, especially in terms of impressive sounding numbers: over 34,000 KFC, Long John Silver's, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell and A&W All-American Food QSRs can currently be patronized in more than 100 countries. Most relevant to the present moment in the world of marketing, a principle factor in the success of Yum! Brands QSRs has been an aggressive use of co-branding, prompting a case study by Cathy Enz at Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Administration Quarterly in 2003 that analyzed in depth the benefits of co-branding as it pertained to Yum! Brands, Inc.
According to Enz, Yum! Brands CEO David Novak has committed the corporation to more than tripling its number of co-branded locations by 2007. This means more Pizza Hut/Taco Bell's, more Long John Silver's/A&W's, and ultimately more Pizza Hut/Taco Bell's combined with other Yum! Brands brands in highly experimental "3in1" destinations.
For Adam, the combination of multiple Yum! Brands in one location meant that, after finding a Togo's Sandwiches and Baskin-Robbins 31 Flavors 0.3 miles apart on the SW Beaverton-Hillsdale Hwy, only to discover upon arrival that Togo's was closed; a KFC/A&W's was there to equally serve his fast-casual dinner and after dinner treat needs:
Adam's observations about the regional branding of individuals really struck a chord with me. What does it mean to be "Beaverton" as opposed to "Portland"? A number of associations are attached to each city, in much the same way we as consumers are encouraged to attach mouthwatering point-of-sale concepts such as "tastiness" and "yumminess" to the food products manufactured and distributed by Yum! Brands, Inc. Cities even market themselves to prospective businesses and young talented people, and are encouraged to do so by trend hunting pop-sociologists like Richard Florida.
Branding is not exclusive to the world of consumption. It taps into a much deeper human need for identification with regional and/or sociological subgroups. Perhaps thinking of branding in this way will re-direct our understandable disdain for the world of branding and help us better comprehend the causal forces behind Yum! Brands, Inc.'s alarming success. Of course, the appreciation Adam expresses for his situation is couched in a certain irony: the distance between artist and object is obtainable through art, but perhaps not so in critical writing.
How to discuss Yum! Brands without descending into bitter critique? Maybe just make a video.
June 16, 2006
Key Art creates the "buzz"
The Hollywood Reporter's Key Art Awards, Humberto Cruz, Cereal Partners Worldwide Global (pdf)
Tonight is the night, when more than 1,800 media executives and creative professionals congregate in the opulent bosom of Hollywood's Kodak Theatre for an evening of self-congratulatory revelry. The 35th Annual Key Art Awards will mete out well deserved honors to a handful of lucky promotional objects, plucked from the ranks of 1,423 submissions and judged by more than 460 movie-advertising professionals. Having tried unsuccessfully to weasel a press pass out of various representatives at the Reporter, I will have to content myself with the many impressive numbers in the Reporter's own coverage of the event which they themselves conceived in 1972, and have sponsored every year since.
Interestingly, the Key Art Awards Post Awards Party is being sponsored by the Los Angeles Times, and by the Chicago Tribune, which owns the Los Angeles Times. It is tempting to posit that, with the Tribune Company involved, there is very real potential for a Humberto Cruz sighting. Of course, I will not be privileged with such a sighting, as I will not be in attendance, as I failed to sweet talk the Key Art Awards representatives at The Hollywood Reporter.
It will be interesting to see which spot wins in the Co-branded audiovisual category. My money is on Chicken Little/McDonald's, but I wouldn't be surprised to see Chicken Little/Sears take home the honors. Not since Fievel immigrated to America to appear somewhat incongruously on a Christmas stocking has there been so much excitement surrounding McDonald's, Sears and the cultural homogenization of talking animals.
Incidentally, The Chronicles of Narnia has also been double-nominated in the category, for co-branded spots with McDonald's and CPW Global, respectively. The "CPW" stands for Cereal Partners Worldwide, a joint venture between General Mills and Nestlé headquartered in Switzerland and offering cereal products in 130 countries not including the U.S. or Canada. Ostensibly, the "Global" addendum means new markets: New Worldwide Global Markets.
The documentation from CPW's investment seminar makes for a fascinating read if you have time. The General Mills/Nestlé combo is a co-brand in and of itself, meaning, of course, that in terms of sheer co-brandedness, the Narnia/CPW spots are really head and shoulders above their competitors. In any case, Cereal Partners Worldwide Global is the brand responsible for these delightful outcomes of multi-corporate cooperation.
June 14, 2006
What Is This?
American Speech, Humberto Cruz, The Hollywood Reporter's Key Art Awards, Haas Scholars, Levi Strauss & Co.
In the winter of 1997, the linguistics journal American Speech published in its appropriately titled recurring column "Among the New Words" a citation of the new word, co-branding:
Credited to the Chicago Tribune writer Humberto Cruz, the clever turn of phrase clearly establishes that, as VISA tells us, consumers of today are as "savvy" as they are "inquisite." Published alongside the co-branding entry in "Among the New Words" is a citation for co-branded card, providing further elucidation of the concept and of the article by Cruz from whence it springs:
One might argue that Cruz is simply providing a venue for VISA PR one-liners that themselves create "the hottest trend in the card industry" through publicity hype. Yet, the trend did become/remain popular and expand to other industries. In 2004, The Hollywood Reporter's Key Art Awards, which yearly recognizes excellence in the field of motion picture marketing, added new award categories for co-branded audiovisual and co-branded print advertising. That year, The Matrix Reloaded teamed with Heineken beer in a television spot titled The Waitress to take audiovisual honors. S.W.A.T. met Nextel to win for co-branded print.
That films would pair with products, as VISA pairs with "toys and even pet food," is perhaps unsurprising. After all, films and advertising have, since the inception of cinema, been involved in a mutually shameless relationship. However, actually viewing these co-branded advertisements, considering the ramifications of each pairing, forces an appreciation of them as cultural products inextricably linked to the current historical moment in both entertainment and consumption. In fact, it is entertainment and consumption that are inextricably linked to each other in our present moment, and that is where the importance of understanding co-branded film advertising comes in.
With this blog, I will attempt a deeper analysis of TV spots like "The Waitress," to understand more than to mock, but always to highlight how truly bizarre these pairings can be. Along with consideration of individual TV spots, I will provide crucial historical background info, as I trace the histories of film, advertising, television and corporate branding in coterminous juxtaposition. Eventually, my research, which is funded by Bob and Colleen Haas of the Levi's pant jean company, will form the better part of a larger paper historically situating the film/advertising relationship over the last 100 years.