A cheap TV spot translated into Chinese is like cheap soy sauce – it could leave a bad taste in the mouth, says Albert Yue, director of Markham, Ont.-based Dynasty Advertising.
The agency’s new campaign for Toronto-based retailer Northeast Telecom is anything but cheap. Shot in Beijing on 35mm film, both the 60- and 30-second spots depict a couple sending e-mail via their cellphones in a café. When they notice a young man being hassled by a couple of thugs outside, they suddenly become reminiscent of the characters in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; their cellphones are tossed into the air where they magically transform into sleek swords and the duo easily overcomes the bad guys in a sequence of beautifully choreographed martial arts scenes.
The major difference between the 60-second ‘Hero’ and 30-second ‘Total Phone’ commercials is that the latter promotes a new offering from Rogers AT&T (Northeast Telecom, which has six locations in the GTA, is a Rogers AT&T dealer), which boasts better rates without contracts or phone cards. The tagline is: ‘Northeast Telecom, the choice of heroes.’
Yue won’t discuss the production budget for the campaign, but admits it was higher than that for the typical Chinese-targeted effort – and that’s a good thing. ‘The target market appreciates advertising creative as much as the mainstream market,’ he says.
That’s especially true when dealing with the 17-to-25s who Northeast Telecom aspires to reach. According to Yue, the slick Crouching Tiger/Matrix-inspired premise will resonate with this crowd, without alienating a very important secondary market of 25-to-35s. [Check out ‘Hero’ at www.strategymag.com/screeningroom/.]
He explains: ‘When you hold a cellphone, it’s almost an image of being superior. If I have the high-tech phone, the smallest phone, the one that takes photos, then I’m the guy. It’s a showy thing.’
The commercials launched in mid-October during Chinese programming on Fairchild Television and Omni 2, and were preceded by teaser print ads in Toronto’s Chinese-language newspapers. The four-colour print creative hyped the overseas production and directed consumers to the channels to view it.
If all goes well, Yue says the no-dialogue spots might even be adopted for the mainstream market.
Client: Northeast Telecom
Agency: Dynasty Advertising
Creative Team: Doris Leung, Patrick Wong, Brian Cheuk, Jamie Spurway, Charlie Ho, Calantha Mak
Client Service: Albert Yue,
Wendy Fok
Production Company:
Avia Productions
Producer: Brian Cheuk
Hong Kong Production Company: October Pictures
Hong Kong Producer: Chen-on Chu
Director/Art Director: Rosa Pang
Director of Photography: Jason Kwan
Production Management (Beijing):
Kai Feng
SFX & Mixing: Soundfirm
