In this Spike Jonze ad for Kenzo, Margaret Qualley breaks away from pretending to laugh at banquet jokes and her so-called role in society to dance by herself through a building, all to an original soundtrack created by Spike's brother, Sam Spiegel.
People are describing this spot in such glowing terms as being the complete antithesis of the usual perfume ad that usually features a demure woman acting all dramatic and caressing a bottle.
That may be true for perfume ads. But it's also the same exact concept as Jonze's Weapon of Choice music video, in which Christopher Walken, also beaten down and out of place from the societal demands of being a businessman, frees himself by dancing when no one is watching. So score one for female empowerment, but minus two thousand points for repeating yourself.
Client: Kenzo Director: Spike Jonze Music: "Mutant brain," by Sam Spiegel Principal talent: Margarey Qualley Choreographer: Ryan Heffington Creative Directors: Carol Lim, Ryan Heffington
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I get it. Try something besides the nearly romance novel sex theme. The target buyer is already listening to tribal/dub/techno and can identify with the dancer (Name the most popular TV shows with women audience.) or I don't know because I jumped forward every 10 seconds till EOF.
I have all of Jonze's work on DVD and "Weapon of Choice" is locked down by Them and They -- So who wants to give all the revenue to Them?
Besides the mess of the music bed the actor in this doesn't seem to be a skilled dancer like Walken. Yes, I'm judging.
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PermalinkShe trained as a ballerina actually, in an apprenticeship to the American Ballet Theater. It's the choreographer who made her look like Elaine Benes from Seinfeld on bath salts.
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PermalinkI disliked the dance, but not her execution of it, to me it's quite obvious that she's trained as a dancer and has full control of every move. Plus, her shoes were a dead giveaway I knew she was going to start dancing as soon as I saw them. There's simply no surprise there. When Weapon of choice had Walken dancing, the interesting thing there was the "shock" to see a man who played a hundred bad guys move like Fred Astaire. The world knew Walken as an actor. The world barely knows Margarey Qualley, so there's no shock at all here. She could be a random dancer.
Now, in Europe where perfume ads are edited down to 15 second reminder snippets on TV, all we will ever see is that majestic splash through the flower logo. And that is pretty much every perfume ad ever, so, nothing new there either.
The only thing sort of "fresh" here is that Margarey Qualley is sort of a cuter version of her mother, Andie McDowell. BTW, here's Andie in US Vogue March 1981, showing off her high kick.
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