Looking at Art and Copy

(This is a Documentary and not eligible for a star rating)

You can advertise anything. My inbox is full of brash and bold ads for things I would scarcely dare to even mention in mixed company. Every day we are exposed to thousands of commercial messages, solicitations and manipulations. They are on our television programs and they are our television programs; they are in our computers, on our websites, on the phone, on the highway, in the post and even on our underwear.

These ads are for every product, service and person imaginable and in Doug Pray’s film Art & Copy, we will see adverts for cars, for airflight, for milk, for computers and for previously unknown fashion designers. On the surface, this film looks like a very good and compelling idea, the very luminiferous aether is subject to the dominion of commercial persuasion, it buzzes not now with the mere propagation of light-waves but the propagation of advertisements. Unfortunately, the director forgets that it is indeed possible to make an advertisement for anything and in the end produces little more than a protracted advertisement for the theory and practice of advertising itself.

We are introduced to a number of ad executives and creative types, then sit through the showing and discussion of a great many exceptionally high quality advertisements. The “1984” spot and various other Apple ads, the VW beetle campaign, “Got Milk” and other icons of achievement in commercial art are duly trotted out and chattered over by the eager executives. Always, eager executives, not one naysayer is ever present, no-one challenges the artistic integrity of commercial ‘art’, no one raises doubts about advertisings pervasiveness, no one wonders of advertising is actually appropriate and effective anyway. The director has no intention whatsoever of showing anything negative about the industry. The good is fêted and the terrible, crass, ineffectual and boring ads are conspicuous in their absence.

This is a tremendous letdown. The trailer for Art and Copy leads one to believe that the film will address these and other important topics such as ethics, financials, commercial influence, editorial control, social impact and other weighty bits—but alas, no…

Anything remotely negative about the industry was either ignored or batted away. Also notably absent were anything other than the most insubstantial discussions of the theory of advertising and where where the little guys? Pray must have forgotten to invite them to the party, tch tch.

Perhaps the most telling example of this is the Nike “Just do it” campaign. “Just do it”, according to people interviewed for the film inspired tremendous reaction, people got divorces, got married and made other major life decisions on the basis of this slogan. Is that not slightly… disturbing? Never is that question raised. This is surprising, not only is it right to ask such questions, it is presently very chic.

One is left with very little to grasp at, suits sitting around and talking to the camera are not very interesting in and of themselves, the human interest aspect is squandered; the direction and mise en scene are badly erratic and no sense of engagement is to be had, the film lacks any sort of interest whatsoever. About halfway through the film I lost the ability to take the show seriously.

As the credits rolled and the DVD stopped (but not before flashing the Sony logo in our face), I left the theater with the sense of ennui, irritation and slight exhaustion that one has after taking a particularly invasive sales call, the only difference was I had a $5 hole in my wallet and a ticket stub, printed with an ad for the company that made the cinema’s ticket machine.

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