COMMERCIALS NEWS

No Old Man and the Sea

Mon, 07 Nov 2011 12:36

Cape Town Fish Market

It was irresponsible meeting Bioscope Film’s director, Hylton Tannenbaum, and Lowe Bull Cape Town creative director, Alistair Morgan, at Fireman’s Arms.

These are two entertaining guys and when I checked my notes later it was a tequila induced scrawl. But fun is what their latest campaign is about and — where some advertising leaves you with a headache — this leaves you with a smile.

Freshening up the brand was Lowe Bull’s task when they won the pitch for Cape Town Fish Market (CTFM). Their brief was to be more accessible and it was with a spirit of fun that Morgan and Tannenbaum took to the ocean.

No Old Man and the Sea for CTFM; no sir, that geezer was an amateur. It’s bootcamp for fishermen: ‘The Academy of Fresh’, and they’re serious about landing that catch.

One of the AOF instructors is an Amazonian woman who’ll fish slap you silly. Frogmen swim in tighter formation than Jub Jub’s bodyguards and, if the singing through your snorkel isn’t up to scratch, the seagulls will let you know with a well aimed projectile. It’s hard out there and recruits need toughening up, even if it means tying them to anchors for a closer inspection of the ocean floor.

Sounds like a fun shoot, but it wasn’t without challenges as anybody who has shot on water knows. Two days on the big bouncy wet filming from a rubber duck will take its toll. Add two weather days and long misty spells and you start imagining the Black Pearl bearing down on you — or is that the insurance man? Of course bouts of seasickness complete the picture.

But they got it in the bag and made it look easy – just in time to flight during the Rugby World Cup. CTFM has seen a significant rise in turnover; so although you cried into your early morning beer as you watched the Springboks sink, you may have got a lift from these other South African icons: the fishermen from the Academy of Fresh.

SCREENAFRICA Print Magazine – November 2011 (view here)
By Antone Crone

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