My Favourite Bruno Aveillan Commercials
This is another in the globally popular ACES series of featuring commercial filmmakers and directors that I admire for their skills in bringing creative concepts and storylines to enthralling life.
Bruno Aveillan
After graduating from the Ecole Supérieure des Beaux Arts in Toulouse, Bruno joined Quad Productions in Paris in 1995, and rose to become an internationally sought after filmmaker and commercial director.
He has won over 200 international awards for his cinematographic craftsmanship, and his storytelling artistry has become a global reference of filmic excellence for the advertising communication industry.
In 2009, the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, featured a retrospective of Bruno Aveillan’s films, in a major exhibition of cinematic art in advertising, held at the Louvre.
1. Louis Vuitton Journey, Where Will Life Take You?
Advertising Agency: Ogilvy, Paris, France
Creative Director: Christian Reuilly
Agency Producer Laure Bayle.
Production Company: QUAD, Paris, France
Director of Photography: Philippe Lesourd
Post Production and Special Effects Studios: WIZZ, Paris, France
Luxury Goods Company LVMH and Ogilvy Paris agency’s, first ever Louis Vuitton commercial, directed by esteemed filmmaker Bruno Aveillan in 2008, won a host of advertising industry awards that included a Clio Gold, a London International Festival Gold, a New York Festival World Medal, and a Stratégies de la communication d’engagement, Grand Prix.
Bruno Aveillan’s mesmerising ‘Journey’ images, accompanied by Argentine musician and composer Gustavo-Santaolalla’s haunting soundtrack, was described in a Louis Vuitton’s press release as, “poetically juxtaposing the founding essence of the Louis Vuitton brand which resides in the passion and art of travel, to our own life’s journey of the most quintessential moments that we have all experienced at one point in time, when our senses and sense of awe, are surpassed by the absolute beauty of a place”.
2. AlUla, The World’s Masterpiece
Advertising Agency: Leo Burnett KSA, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Creative Directors: Mohamed Sehly, and Saadi Alkouatli
Production Company: QUAD, Paris, France
Service Production Company: Two Tales, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Even though AlUla, a city of the Medina Region in north-western Saudi Arabia, is one of the largest cultural heritage sites in the world, not many people know about it. The Royal commission for AlUla (RCU) aimed to change that with the launch of a tourism campaign in 2021, featuring an entrancing, cinematic journey, across the ancient landscape by, maestro filmmaker Bruno Aveillan.
The scenic UNESCO World Heritage Sites, of Hegra, Dadan, Jabal Ikmah, AlUla Old Town, and Jabal AlFil (Elephant Rock), with their human history stretching back more than 200,000 years, beckon with their haunting and astonishing beauty in the superbly produced Bruno Aveillan short film.
3. Peugeot 2008 SUV, Instinct
Advertising Agency: BETC, Paris, France
Executive Creative Director: Remi Babinet
Creative Director: Vincent Behaeghel
Production Company: QUAD, Paris, France
Producer: Martin Coulais
Post Production, 3D & CGI Animation Company: FIX Studio, Paris France
Directed by renowned filmmaker, Bruno Aveillan, BETC Agency’s 2016, Peugeot ‘Instinct’ film-scenario, echoing the marques’s ‘Motion & Emotion’ signature of many years, comes to stellar life with aesthetic film-craft skills, that are mesmerisingly cinematic to behold.
4. Shangri-La Hotels & Resorts, Wolves
Advertising Agency: Ogilvy, Hong Kong, China
Creative Director: Pierre Desfretier
Art Director: Genevieve Hardy
Copywriters: Kwei Chee Lam, Edgard Montjean, and Troy Sullivan
Production Company : QUAD, Paris, France
Post Production and VFX Studios: FIX, Paris, France
Animal Trainer: Pierre Cadeac
Advertising Agency Ogilvy’s 2010 ‘Wolves’ film-scenario, for multinational hospitality company Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts, based in Hong Kong, was inspired by the kind of Asian hospitality that the Shangri-La culture offers of genuine care and respect for guests and colleagues and treating them like family.
Masterly directed by filmmaker Bruno Aveillan, the Spikes Asia Tv/Cinema Craft Gold award commercial, filmed with famous animal trainer Pierre Cadeac’s real wolves, in the French Alps, is an entertaining departure from the hospitality advertising genre’s convention of glitzy lobbies, chandeliers, and smiling faces.
5. Guerlain, The Legend of Shalimar
Agency: House of Guerlain, Paris, France
Artistic Director: Benjamin De Lapperent
Advertising Production Director: Jeannine Burglé
‘Shalimar’, which in India’s Sanskrit language means ‘Temple of Love’, was created in 1921 by Master Perfumer Jacques Guerlain, as a tribute to the 17th century Persian love story of Shah Jahan and his Empress consort, Mumtaz Mahal.
The Taj Mahal mausoleum the Shah built for his wife, who died at the age of 37, is monument of undying love and a World Heritage, Indo-Islamic art and architecture masterpiece, surrounded by a historically designed, exquisite Persian landscape known as the ‘Shalimar Gardens’.
The spectacular love story was directed and filmed by Bruno Aveillan on various locations in India, from Jaipur to Udaipur and the Taj Mahal in Agra, using a 35-mm high-speed, megapixel ‘anamorphic phantom’ camera.
Russian Actress and Guerlain supermodel, Natalia Vodianova stars as Princess Mumtaz Mahal, and the soundtrack was specially composed and scored by Hans Zimmer for this epic short film.
6. Cartier, The Odyssey
Advertising Agency: Marcel, Paris, France
Creative Director: Sébastien Vacherot
Art Director: Emmanuel Lallève
Copywriter: Seyrane Boulekbache
Production Company: QUAD, Paris, France
Director of Photography: Patrick Duroux
Post Production and VFX Studios: Digital District, Paris, France
King Edward VII of England one described Cartier as “the jeweller of kings, and the king of jewellers”.
The Paris Jewellers’ long tradition of royal patronage includes the courts of Europe, Russia, Serbia, Siam, Greece, Romania, Egypt and Albania.
The focus of this spectacular commercial of Cartier’s 165-year history, directed by renowned filmmaker Bruno Aveilan, centres on the coming to life of Cartier’s signature Panther icon.
The subsequent time-travel scenario of the live Panther’s global journey to the past, highlights key moments from Cartiers sumptuous, long history.
Included is a scene of Brazilian inventor and aviation pioneer Alberto Santos-Dumont and his ‘Demoiselle’ monoplane, for whom Cartier created his first men’s wristwatch so that Alberto could check his flight-times while keeping both hands on the controls.
Another scene depicts the panther at an Indian palace, filled with Cartier’s famous nature inspired jewellery pieces, before coming home to supermodel Shalom Harlow at Cartier’s birthplace, the Grand Palais in Paris.
The cinematic short-film epic, premiered at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 2012, and went on to accrue a Cannes Gold Lion, more than 40 other International Gold awards, and 180 million views around the globe.
7. Cartier, Shape You Time
Advertising Agency: Publicis 133, Paris, France
Creative Director: Sebastien Vacherot
Art Director: Antoine Bonodot
Copywriter: Noé Sato
Production Company: QUAD, Paris, France
Post Production and Special Effects Studios: WIZZ, Paris, France
The Cannes Lion Film Craft commercial, directed by Bruno Aveillan for Cartier’s famous watches, continues with the iconic brand’s Panther motive, in an immersive time-travel epic of Cartier’s horology past and future.
The soundtrack is an adapted version of the ‘Odyssey’ music score by composer Pierre Adenot, that was recorded at the famous Abbey Road Studios in London, and awarded a Cannes Gold Lion for music.
8. Puy du Fou, Eternals
Advertising Agency: Les Gros Mots, Paris, France
Creative Directors: Nicolas Schmitt, and Gérald Schmite
Production Company: QUAD, Paris, France
Post Production, 3D & CGI Animation Company: FIX Studio, Paris France
Music and Sound Design Studios: AOC, Paris, France
The historically themed ‘Puy du Fou’ park, situated in the Vendée region of Western France, has won many international awards for its outstanding innovations of spectacular visitor attractions.
Directed by esteemed filmmaker Bruno Aveillan, ‘Eternals’ is a superbly produced, cinematic epic, of time-travel fantasy encounters, that are highly engaging to view.