Lovely Clive

As I said I would, a very special shout-out goes to the person who could told me where to find The Hire on-line. This one's for you, Pierre Belanger.

Premise: I'm not going to sit here and type out premises to all eight shorts, but there is a general plot to them all. The Driver (Clive Owen) is hired, and he internationally chauffeurs various celebs around through helicopter and machine gun fuelled car chases.

Okay, there aren't helicopters every time.

Last night, my professor put the final nail in the coffin of my dislike for his grandstanding ways by showing us Ticker and leading quite the involved discussion about whether and how this advertising method works.

One girl pointed out that producing these short films (all under 10 minutes) allows BMW to attract bigger names like Owen, Don Cheadle, F. Murray Abraham, Dennis Haysbert, and Ray Liotta (all in Ticker alone) as well as directors like Tony Scott, Guy Ritchie, John Woo, and Ang Lee. Okay, she really didn't know half those names, but she caught Ridley Scott as a producer and Owen, so bully for her.

Of course, if the girl had done her homework (not that we were assigned homework about BMW Films), she wouldn't have bothered opening her mouth with stupid points like this one. Although we know my love for Clive began some time ago, it wasn't really until Closer that he became a household name. The shorts started long before that movie.

In fact, BMW approached Owen after Croupier, which no one saw. Well, lots of people saw it, but it took forever to turn a decent profit in the box office. It did, however, turn the industry's eye to Owen, and BMW snapped him up before he commanded astronomical salaries and the fantasies of women worldwide.

As for the directors, I've already turned my eye to the startling number of major players at the helm of TV spots, which are shorter and vastly different than The Hire.

Some theorists argue that television shows are built solely to showcase commercials. Outside of TiVo and PVR, they say, you have to watch the commercials in order to get the content you want. So why would BMW place their ads solely on the internet, away from your TV and annoying pop-ups?

BMW says that 85% of their purchases are researched on the internet before hand. A guy in my class pointed out that the shorts don't tell you anything about the car you are seeing. He's right - you are free from seeing a car drive across the desert/salt flat/deserted highway/empty city while a voice over tells you all about the command seating or five-star crash rating or whatever minor improvement a given car company happens to be touting at this moment. No one ever references the car, never mind the make or model.

So you have to go the website to download or stream the shorts, and they still won't try to sell you on the benefits of the Z3. Hmmm. . .

BMW isn't selling a car at all. Commercials sell cars, test drives sell cars, word of mouth sell cars, ratings sell cars. Short films, on the other hand, are about branding - they sell a lifestyle. Obviously you'll never be as sexy, cool-headed, and upright as the Driver, but, when you drive the car, you'll be the next best thing. You'll get to shift the gears (nary a film without at least one shot of the gear shift). You'll hear the engine roar live and in person, and everyone will look at you and what you are driving.

See, when you buy an expensive car, when you really love an expensive car, it's a crime to keep it locked up à la Cameron's dad. All you really want is to see what she can do.

Plus, these films represent a huge opportunity for Owen. He gets to sample the work of internationally acclaimed directors and actors outside of the watchful eye of the press, allowing him to gather what's potentially decades of experience in a few short years.

Above all, for BMW, the consumers come to you. They aren't zipping through your commercials or blocking your pop-ups/behinds. And you don't have to pay like you do every time a commercial airs.

It's bloody brilliant. A+