Gandini Juggling

From one exceptionally bad ad to a couple of great ones.

This one features Owen Reynolds and Sean Gandini of Gandini Juggling - the world's leading group of juggling specialists.

It was developed by MetropolitanRepublic and The Jupiter Drawing Room for MTN Business, like last year's catchy MTN Handclap ad.

On the Handclap ad, I enjoyed this comment:

That's cool. But seriously: what does it have to do with cellphones? Still - I guess it's nice to see MTN putting content ONTO youtube for a change - instead of just taking it off ;-)

The commenter is of course referring to MTN's confusing OK Go ad (on Cherryflava), which sparked some conversation in the comments around... what would you call it, "brand association"?

Co-branding is also an interesting concept.

Back to the juggling ad. Via BizCommunity's Greg Gray directs new MTN "Jugglers" commercial:

According to Paul Warner Executive Creative Planner for MetropolitanRepublic, "We used a visual metaphor of juggling to illustrate the power of two in business. This involved scouting the world for the top juggling duo to pull this off."

Director Greg Gray of Velocity Films and Warner then worked with the juggling duo to develop a specific sequence for the ad from the juggler's repertoire of juggling “formations” before shooting began. In the edit process an interesting sound track from RJD2's Deadringer album was secured to complement the engaging juggling routine and the result is a striking piece of film that successfully highlights the benefits of a partnership in business.

RJD2's music has been featured in a number of global advertisements - locally, you'll hear Smoke and Mirrors (also off his "Deadringer" album) in J&B's "Connect" ad (what's your 1.618?). The only version I can find of it is a small and low quality version here.

And if you're still feeling uninspired, MetropolitanRepublic have a really nice site. Execution flaws aside, it's a simple and strong concept that I've never seen before. Love it!