You are now entering Ad Space, a realm of commercials, brought before us so we might examine how they work, and discuss why we both love and hate them so. So it is written …

The Product:
NatWest cash machines

The Promotion:

The Pitch:

Sometimes, here on Ad Space, I like to highlight a commercial for no other reason than it being a great showcase of animation. Whether it’s a fractured fairy tale, some adorable kitties, a surprisingly expressive superhero, a fantasmagorical lightshow, or the wildest depiction of where oil comes from I’ve ever seen.

And this week’s ad can stand shoulder to shoulder with any of those. Such an exciting, expressive, exuberant, excellent panorama of ideas, mixing together animation and live-action, black-and-white and color, and realism and stylization into something truly unique.

It’s the sort of gonzo animation that probably wouldn’t be economical or marketable if done as a weekly series. But commercials provide a special place for this sort of animation: the budget to bring these images to life, but with no need to worry about story or continuity or making sense, just so long as the sales pitch is in there somewhere.

People like to rag on the role of advertising in our society, but I’m glad that, occasionally, it allows something like this to exist.