I saw this commercial on Facebook today, and was not only impressed by the cool graphics and concept, but by the symbolism: the "awakening" of a giant - Brazil itself, as a world power. To reinforce this idea, at the end of the video, a sentence appears: "The giant is no longer sleeping."
Liquor brands are making a big push into the Brazilian market, and are going after all levels of consumers. Budweiser recently began a major campaign to push its brand in Brazil (read all about it here), and while in Rio, I spotted some of their print ads. I thought it was interesting that they went for the all-English approach.
Since TV advertising in Brazil is a huge industry that now has more money than ever to throw around, gringos have been popping up in different commercials in recent years. I recently came across a very funny new one, but here's a quick recap of similar commercials.
First, there was Richard Gere hawking hair products...
Shopping malls have become a huge commercial success in Brazil, a destination for families, a place to get dressed up and be seen, a weekend activity, and of course, to buy stuff. In big cities with traffic and crime, malls have become a way for the upper and middle classes to escape the hordes into a secluded, air-conditioned bubble, and for the emerging lower middle class to access the products they previously couldn't afford. Because malls are big businesses, their PR people have started bringing in big Hollywood stars to help promote them - in these cases, some of the swankiest and most expensive malls in the country.
And this isn't for a mall (it's for hair products), but it's an oldie but goodie. See more gringos in Brazil on Top Ten Gringos in Brazil!
This Perrier commercial is a cool idea, but just when you think it's in Europe somewhere, or maybe LA, BOOM! You're in Rio.
Update: A few Cariocas over at Diario do Rio figured out that the whole thing was filmed in Rio but was edited to make it look like Europe, even changing the license plates and signs. Good eyes, guys!
I admit this commercial is a little perplexing...a YouTube commenter came up with this explanation: a man from Portugal emigrates to Brazil, where he marries a Brazilian. They move to the US and they have a son. Thus, a widow with a Brazilian accent, a guy translating into English, and the deceased wearing the national colors of Portugal.
Otherwise, the commercial doesn't make much sense.
What story do you think could explain this weird scenario?
I'm back from vacation, where I went completely off the grid for a week - no Internet, no Blackberry, no TV. So I've had quite a lot of catching up to do. But one of my favorite things I've found, thanks to my brother in law, is this hilarious set of World Cup commercials from Skol, a Brazilian beer company.
This commercial, which advertises Skol's "talking cans" campaign (they inserted little audio devices into special cans that they distributed throughout Brazil), is also very funny.
In addition to these ads, Skol also did a series of short videos where Brazilians harass Argentines in Sao Paulo to try to "turn them" to become Brazilian football fans:
I also discovered this really simple but great commercial for Vivo. If you've ever wondered what it's like in Brazil during the World Cup, this will give you a small taste:
Also, if you missed the whole Cala a Boca Galvao thing like I did, I recommend this funny article about how Brazilians' exasperation with sports announcer Galvao's ramblings during the World Cup opening confused gringo Twitter users and even convinced some that the expression was to help save an endangered Brazilian bird, and even better, convinced others that it was a new Lady Gaga song.
