How they made the Crunchie commercial

Press, 2 June 1982, Page 23

How they made the Crunchie commercial

Love them or hate them, home-made television commercials are now one of the dominant influences on New Zealand's popular culture. For the growing free lance industry, big-budget commercials are also an important part of their livelihood. In the “Contact” documentary, “They Shoot Commercials Don’t They," which will be screened on One on Thursday, at 8.30 p.m., a cameraman, Alan Guilford, goes on location with the crew making one of the most ambitious commercials ever attempted in this country, and records the trials and tribulations of commercial making. The programme follows the ■ progress of a major commercial, the Crunchie advertisement titled “The Golden Land," which recently won an Axis Award for'best television commercial.. Produced for Colenso Ad-

vertising, “The Golden .Land," was the first commercial to be promoted on television as if it were an actual programme. Excerpts, or “teasers" of the content of the commercial were promoted for days before it appeared in its entirety. Some viewers became so involved in the leadup to its first screening that they organised their viewing time to be in front of their television sets at the appointed time for its first complete screening, according to TVNZ. Guilford followed the film crew for three days — to Waitomo and- Ahipara Beach, and filmed all the problems associated with the production of a large-scale commercial — a camera behind the cameras. The story is told through the eyes of the director of the commercial, Geoff Dixon, as he consults the wardrobe people, the special effects

team, actors specially imported from Australia, and the dozens of people involved in putting 4.5 minutes of television commercial on film. The documentary points out the parallels between the making of a television commercial and the production of a feature film — they both have the same technical problems, weather problems, and recording hitches. More importantly, it underlines the point that commercial producers and feature film producers need each other. It is the money earned by making television commercials which finds its way into the pockets of feature film producers to help finance New Zealand's infant film industry. “So like them or not, television commercials take up seven hours of every week’s viewing time, some of them are very good indeed, and the money earned serves a dual purpose,” says TVNZ.