The ramblings of g1powermac

Microsoft decided to hire Jerry Seinfeld to do a batch of television commercials for Windows Vista. Here’s the first of the series:

The commercial shows Jerry Seinfeld in a shopping mall going past a “Shoe Circus” and spotting Bill Gates in the store. After meeting with him in the store, they talk about the shoe Gates is trying on and about wearing clothes in the shower. Once done with that, Gates buys the shoes and heads out the store with Seinfeld. Now finally in the parking lot, Seinfeld asks Gates if Microsoft is going to come out with a computer that was like ‘cake.’ Then at the end, the words “The Future” are displayed followed by “Delicious” before the Windows Vista logo.

Now here comes my critique as both a filmmaker and a television commercial producer (and probably quite biased as I’m not a MS fan and a co-owner of an independent shoe store). The commercial has some major issues concerning its message. Seinfeld, being who he is, was used to draw the audience to the plot as he’s well known. Once the audience takes notice, Gates is shown. Gates is synonymous with Microsoft so the audience is expecting a message about something to do with MS. Unfortunately, there’s a long and cumbersome story line to go through before a single thing about computers is even mentioned. This story line about the shoe store and the shoes is drawn on too long making the audience think that somehow their previous assumption was wrong and that this commercial was actually about the shoes. Then as the plot finally gets to talking about computers, nothing is mentioned about any actual product, just Seinfeld’s wish to have computers that are edible. And once his questioned is finally answered, we get to the final few scenes with the Windows Vista logo being shown for only a few seconds. By that point, any person watching this commercial is probably confused as to what the commercial was about.

What needed to be done was to edit the commercial down to at most a one minute slot, removing much of the babel at the shoe store. Also, mentioning a real product instead of a conceptual one may help get a stronger message across. And maybe having a voice over at the end with the words and logo will help garner attention from the part of the audience that may not be visually focused on the TV at the time of airing.

Posted by g1powermac under Computers,Filming | Comments Off