Branded content continues to permeate the web, especially in the case of fashion. The latest from luxury brand PRADA enlisted director Roman Polanski to write and direct a film for them that debuted at Cannes.
A Therapy stars Ben Kingsley as a therapist to patient Helena Bonham Carter. Both clad in Prada, with a few subtle and not so subtle product shots (like the stills I grabbed of the shoes and coat shown below), we see that Kingsley is obsessively drawn to his patient's purple Prada coat, culminating in the conclusion that "Prada Suits Everyone."
Hesitant at first, Polanski was given creative freedom and reunited his favorite group of actors, screenwriters, D.P and editors to produce the three and a half minute film shown below.
PRADA presents A Therapy by Roman Polanski.
"A game, a thought, that through friendship and mutual respect has come true. When I was asked to shoot a short movie for Prada, I did not think that I could really be myself, but the reality is that in the total freedom I was given, I had the opportunity to reunite my favorite group of people on set and just have fun.
The chance to dwell on what the fashion world represents nowadays, and the fact that it is accompanied by so many stereotypes is fascinating and at the same time a bit upsetting, but you definitely can not ignore it.
It's very refreshing to know there are still places open to irony and wit, and for sure, Prada is one of them" --Roman Polanski
This is the second short film in a series on cities around the world for Louis Vuitton, using gender as a lens to interpret each city's identity.
above: stills from Jean-Claude Thibaut's When L.A. Is A Man
Directed and written by Jean-Claude Thibaut, the film has some very beautiful scenes of Los Angeles (as in the stills above), despite being accompanied by a voice over of which I am not a big fan (excerpt shown below).
“From the hill, suspended above the starry skyline, L.A. appeared to me as a whole.
He’s a lonely and secretive player, blazing and unrefined, dedicating himself to his dreams - and incidentally ours - with a disconcerting ease.
He has the nerve and imagination of one who has nothing to lose, always walking a tightrope. His weaknesses are concealed.
Untouched by criticism, L.A. works in faith and finds his way to a new era, the one he imagines being his own future. The burning ease of his achievements has something of prodigality and childishness. Each scene of his life is the most important. L.A. is fated to be young forever, eternal. He walks through the night, striding along, indolent while unrestrained, with the style of a gifted kid.
In my mind a far-fetched idea is growing slowly: it seems L.A. gave me this blind confidence to turn things into art, without ever looking back. L.A. drove me where I have never been before.”
I do think the direction is wonderful, even though I exactly don't love the casting and the copy. But it's a lovely look at LA. What do you think?
Nike tapped David Rosenbaum of Mothership to conceive the :51 second short that launched its Flyknit technology and shoe collection. Inspired by the concept of body schema, David developed a story in which the shoe becomes a seamless extension of the runner’s foot through a progression of organic visuals, and took the piece from start to finish.
"Biomorph":
To develop an accurate visual expression for the innovative weaving process director David Rosenbaum met with Nike engineers and watched the shoes being made on customized industrial knitting machines.
The making of "Biomorph":
Credits: Andy Walker, Nike/Dave Gold (music), Elias Arts, creative directors; Ed Ulbrich, Digital Domain, chief creative officer/Mothership, president; David Rosenbaum, Mothership, director; Paul Cameron, Mothership, director of photography; The Bergeron, Nike/Tiffani Manabat, Mothership/Nicola Wiseman, Digital Domain/William Lemmon, Digital Domain, producers; Jesse Canright, Nike/Tanya Cohen, Mothership/Digital Domain/Ann Haugen (music), Elias Arts, executive producers; Barb Freeman, Nike, production manager; Birthe Lauchengco, Mothership, production supervisor; Scott Gemmell, Mothership/Digital Domain, head of production; Rachel Mariscal, Digital Domain, digital production manager; Colin Woods, Digital Domain, editor; Richard Poulain, Digital Domain, storyboard artist; Brian Creasey, Digital Domain/Casey Benn, Digital Domain/Dave Carlson, Digital Domain/Gideon Vandergrift, Digital Domain, generalists; Kevin Culhane, Digital Domain, animator; Ken Jones, Digital Domain/Eric Ebeling, Digital Domain/
The second season of the HBO series Game Of Thrones has begun and each time I watch it, I am mesmerized by the opening title sequence. I wanted to share it with my readers and in doing so, came across two wonderful articles I'm cobbling together.
The first is an article on The Hollywood Reporter which features an interview with Angus Wall, who designed the sequence and titles (and long ago, in another lifetime, worked with me as the editor on one of my tv commercials). You may recognize his name from winning Oscars for editing both The Social Network (2010) and The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (2011).
The other, an impressively comprehensive post from Art of The Title, features another interview with Angus Wall as well as wonderful concept sketches and renderings for the opening sequence that I've shown in this post.
The Hollywood Reporter sat down with the talented Wall last year to ask him how he came up with the idea, what it means and how it was executed. Below is a reprint of that interview with added interspersed images from the Art of The Title article:
Angus Wall of the company Elastic got Emmy noms for Big Love's and Rome's title design and a win for Carnivale, plus a Social Network editing Oscar. But what's hotter now is his genius opening title sequence for HBO's critical smash Game of Thrones. HBO wanted something like the map that begins books like The Lord of the Rings. "We wanted to do something different from the standard tropes for fantasy maps," Wall tells THR. "So we came up with the idea of a world inside a sphere."
The sphere idea came from a '60s sci-fi space station with terrain inside -- yet it had to look nonfuturistic, to evoke the Middle Earth-ish setting of George R.R. Martin's book. "It had to look like it was made in that time, so we immediately referenced Leonardo da Vinci's machines," says Wall. "We wanted it to look like a real place photographed with a real camera."
The computer-illusion "camera" swoops from kingdom to kingdom, focusing on the family crest that sits atop each place -- the "sigil." "The sigil becomes the main cog that triggers the animation" -- the da Vinci device, full of interlocking cogs. "So the model of the place emerges out of the floor of the map and comes to life." Like the show itself, the title sequence strives for realism within a fantasy setting. "In the shadowed areas beneath the surface of the map, there are cogs in there. If you look carefully, you'll see they're all working with the cogs that are exposed above the surface of the map."
The six Sigils (or family crests):
And is this cog-filled da Vinci war engine a metaphor for the many hidden, interlocking machinations of the show's families fighting for the throne -- the Houses of Lannister, Baratheon, and Stark? "Absolutely!" says Wall. "And the map reflects the attitude of each place. Winterfell is a lot more rustic." Kind of like the Shire in Tolkien? "Yes. And each place has its own climate. Southern Westeros is more temperate.To the East, Essos is almost Mediterranean. As you go north, Winterfell gets harsher, and further north, The Wall is a continent-wide wall of ice."
The Wall:
Winterfell sketch and final rendering:
Castleblack sketch and rendering:
Gotswood sketches:
Port city of Pentos:
If you watch the title sequence attentively, you'll see the the feuding families' backstory told in pictures. "In the middle of the sphere there's the sun, and in the middle of the sun there are bands around it, relief sculptures on an astrolabe which tell the legend of the land," explains Wall. "We cut to those three times in the title sequence, so you actually see a history of Westeros and Essos. The third time we see all the animals [representing] the different houses bowing down to the Baratheon stag, which brings us to the present, where there's a Baratheon king [played by Mark Addy]."
The Astrolabe rendering and final:
Got that? George R.R. Martin's 15 million readers are likelier to get it than casual viewers. Wall is bowing down to them, the way he bowed to scholars when he made the Rome opening titles, which were full of authentic graffiti from ancient Rome. "We wanted to be very, very faithful to the book because we knew there would be a large fan base that will be looking at this very carefully," says Wall. In The New Yorker, Laura Miller writes that angry Martin fans call themselves "GRRuMblers," and Martin tells her, "If I f--- it up...they'll come after me with pitchforks and torches."
Dothrak sketches:
Even if you're a peaceable newcomer to Westeros carrying no torch for Martin, Wall thinks the title credits will help you get oriented. "It's not necessarily important that the audience explicitly understands every detail at first. But you always have a sense that there is an internal logic. Title sequences are a weird art -- to function, they have to have that logic -- their own clockwork, as it were."
Eyrie sketches and rendering:
"It's a map that's constantly evolving," says Wall. "We have four different versions. Episode two has a different title sequence, and there are later episodes where we go to two new locations -- The Eyrie and The Twins." But Wall won't say what clockwork wonders await you there. "Those are treats to come." The two-year Thrones experience was a treat for him. "It's one of the most fun projects I've ever worked on." - Hollywood Reporter
And for those interested in a more in depth interview and explanation, be sure to read this article on Art of the Title.
In the process of writing this post I came across this hilarious take-off on the Game Of Thrones opening sequence for The Simpsons, which is definitely worth including.
As Adam Fraser reports on Nokia's conversations blog "Arm eight filmmakers with two Nokia N8s each, a $5,000 budget and ask them to produce a short film within a few weeks and what do you get? A bunch of amazing mini-movies, that’s what. However, there can only be one that wins the top prize of $10,000 USD. That award goes to JW Griffiths, for his movie – Splitscreen. You can see it below.
Love. It’s been the subject of many a movie since the dawn of, well, movies. Splitscreen is about two people falling in love who come from different parts of the world. Using two perspectives at once on the same screen, we’re able to follow each person’s journey through life as they embark on a journey to foreign lands, only to bump into each other half-way across the River Thames on Golden Jubilee Bridge."
Here’s the winning short film, Splitscreen, Shot entirely on the Nokia N8 mobile phone.
Director: James W Griffiths Producer: Kurban Kassam Director of Photography: Christopher Moon Editor: Marianne Kuopanportti Sound Design: Mauricio d'Orey Music composed by: Lennert Busch
above: Pascal Anson and Tracey Emin with the Dove, inspiration for a special art decorated aircraft for British Airways
FLIGHT BA2012 SET TO POP UP! British Airways will launch an exclusive airline themed pop-up venue – ‘Flight BA2012’, celebrating the best in British talent in the run up to the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
Open on select weekdays from April 4 to 17, the three-in-one art gallery, cinema and dining lounge will showcase the works of the BA Great Britons who were mentored by Richard E. Grant, Tracey Emin and Heston Blumenthal.
above: Richard E Grant, Tracey Emin and Heston Blumenthal launch the BA Great Britons Heroes programme (Getty Images)
Artist-designer Pascal Anson, screenwriter Prasanna Purwanarajah and Michelin-star chef Simon Hulstone beat hundreds of incredible entries to be selected as British Airways Great Britons 2012 and will have their work featured in the pop-up venue. Purwanarajah, Anson and Hulstone have created Olympic Games themed film, art and food respectively- a short-film named Boy, ‘Dove’ artwork livery for the celebratory aircraft and a bold British menu.
The airline-themed venue, hosted in East London, has been exclusively designed to recreate a premium flying experience and will offer guests a sneak preview of the Great Britons works before they are rolled out on flights beginning this month.
ART:
Flight BA2012 includes artwork from artist-designer Pascal Anson from Brighton, who was mentored by Tracey Emin on his ‘Dove’ design for a range of celebratory aircraft displayed in the gallery.
above: Pascal Anson and Tracey Emin look over Dove artwork (Pic: Nick Morrish/BA) above: Dove drawings by Pascal Anson (courtesy of the artist)
FILM:
It also features short film ‘BOY’ starring Timothy Spall, written by screenwriter Prasanna Purwanarajah under the mentorship of Richard E. Grant, which will be screened in the cinema.
Trailer for 'BOY':
DINING / FOOD:
Guests will also be able to sample a bold British menu created by Michelin-star chef Simon Hulstone, who has produced an Olympic Games inspired menu under the guidance of Heston Blumenthal. (Unfortunately, tickets to the Flight BA2012 dining lounge are already sold out).
above: Not your normal airline food - Simon Hulstone's Fish Pie is a work of art (photo courtesy of Jim Wileman, British Airways) above: Simon Hulstone at work above: Heston Blumenthal and Simon Hulstone devised the Olympic-themed menu
Frank van der Post, British Airways managing director of brands and customer experience, said: “We wanted to bring the flying experience to the public, allowing guests to preview our in-flight entertainment, celebratory aircraft livery and on-board menus in anticipation of the London 2012 Games. This is going to be an exciting year for the capital and this is just the very start of our take-off!”
• Flight BA2012 is located at 3-10 Shoreditch High St, East London, E1 6PG.
• For £50, guests will receive entry to the gallery and screening room, plus a welcome glass of champagne, sit down three course menu with amuse bouche, and tea, coffee and petit four. (This dining experience is no longer available /sold out)
• Flight BA2012 will be open on April; 4, 5, 10, 11, 12, 13, 16 and 17 only and closed for Easter and at the weekend
• The first scheduled flight for ‘The Dove’ will be in early April
• Short film BOY will be shown on all long-haul flights from April
• Simon’s menu will be available on long-haul flights departing London Heathrow between July and September (excluding certain routes such as India and Japan).
• The airline worked with LOCOG, BAFTA, the Fat Duck Experimental team and the Royal Academy of Arts on the BA Great Britons programme
