My Favourite Martin Werner 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.
Martin Werner
Production Company Academy Film’s website, describes Danish born Martin Werner as one of Scandinavia’s most awarded, and highly sought after directors.
He worked as a gifted advertising agency art director until 1994, when he decided to turn his talents to directing commercials, subsequently becoming one of the most respected and loved filmmakers in Denmark and far beyond.
The nuanced humour, textured subtlety, and understated emotion he is able to bring to his craft, I believe, places him in a very elite class of multi-talented, storytelling filmmakers, and commercial directors.
1. Magnum, Pleasureverse
Advertising Agency: LOLA Mullenlowe, Madrid, Spain
Production Company: Proppa, Madrid, Spain
Service Production Company: Filmsquad, Budapest, Hungary
Post Production and VFX Studios: BaconX, Frederiksberg, Denmark
The Magnum commercial about real world pleasure was directed by filmmaker Martin Werner in an impressively produced film, featuring an avatar in her dull, insular, and pixelated ‘metaverse’, versus the vibrancy of real life encounters and sensuous enjoyment.
Magnum’s advertising proposition, for decades has been about celebrating the real pleasures of life, and their ‘Pleasureverse’ scenario underlines the genuine enjoyment their chocolate coated ice cream offerings provide that no technology, no matter how sophisticated it might be, can ever replicate.
2. Dutch State Lottery, Cuckoo-Clock Fritsie
Advertising Agency: TBWA\NEBOKO, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Production Company and VFX Studio: CZAR, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Directed by filmmaker Martin Werner, the inspired scenario, featuring cuckoo-clock ‘Fritsie’, is a an endearing and masterly produced tale.
The resonant soundtrack is by Dutch, indie pop–ambient band, HAEVN, and British singer-songwriter, Jasmine van den Bogaerde, popularly known by her stage name of Birdy.
3. Dutch State Lottery, Little Dog Frekkel
Advertising Agency: TBWA\NEBOKO, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Production Company CZAR, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Post Production and VFX Studio: Ambassadors, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Directed by filmmaker Martin Werner, the ‘lost-snd-found’ scenario about a scruffy little dog named Frekkel, with low self esteem, is brought to emotive life, in an empathic short-film, featuring a soundtrack by Ambassadors Amsterdam’s, sound composer and engineer, Rens Pluijm.
4. Interflora, Date Night
Advertising Agency: PONG, Copenhagen, Denmark
Production Company: Bacon, Copenhagen, Denmark
This poignant commercial with its heart-felt ending, was directed with admirable sensitivity and emotive depth by filmmaker Martin Werner.
Featuring a soundtrack of “Slow Mover” by Danish classical composer Louise Alenius, Interflora’s ‘Date Night’ makes for memorable viewing.
5. Swisscom TV 2.0, Nico
Advertising Agency: Heimat, Berlin, Germany
Production Company: Pumpkin Film, Zürich, Switzerland
I remain enamoured by Switzerland’s major telecommunications provider, Swisscom’s ‘Nico’ commercial, eight years after it was produced, that features a cinematically panoramic terrain, of amassed Saracen and Roman forces, prepared to do battle.
Superbly directed by filmmaker Martin Werner, the mystery of the epic’s ‘cut-away’ scenes from the historic drama, to the mundane, modern-day activities of ‘Nico’, is very amusingly solved in the end, and makes for impactful viewing of Heimat Agency’s inspirationally conceived delayed battle scenario.
6. Orange Telecom, Alone In The World
Advertising Agency: Publicis Conseil, Paris, France
Production Company: Henry, Paris, France
Post Production Company: McMurphy Baconx, Paris, France
The ‘Alone In The World’ commercial is part of an integrated campaign to highlight Orange mobile’s 24-hour service guarantee.
It ensures that in case of loss, theft or damage, the loan of a replacement smart-phone will immediately be made available.
Directed by filmmaker Martin Werner, this amusing scenario, insightfully dramatises the mental anguish experienced when one looses a smartphone, even for a few minutes, and how cut off from the world that feeling is.
The visually entertaining, metaphoric exaggeration, is something many smart-phone owners will to be able to relate to with knowing smiles.
7. Interflora, Give Love A Helping Hand
Advertising Agency: Brandhouse, Copenhagen, Sweden
Production Company: Bacon, Copenhagen, Sweden
Interflora’s charming ‘Helping Hand’ story, directed by filmmaker Marin Werner, is an intimately observed portrayal of a single-parent Dad and his young lad, who suddenly becomes surprisingly messy.
His Dad patiently dismisses it as all part of growing up, blissfully unaware that the clothes piling up in laundry basket, are all part of his scheming son’s carefully laid plans.