Maybe it’s just us but we’re not sure we’d stick around the entire two minutes just to find out this commercial is for the launch of French GQ. Aside from the fact we did stick around (after all, that’s what we do here) and we knew it was for GQ going in (because we were told). Now, we get that some brands like to do the tease/lead-up-to-the-joke thing but this commercial just goes on and one and on and on and one…and on…with the same joke over and over and over and…well, you get the point.
Early on, it becomes obvious the commercial is going to deliver the joke but it takes far too long to get there. And when it does get there with the predictable “the ideal man doesn’t exist” tagline, you’ve already figured that out but you still don’t know who’s saying it. For that, you have to wait an additional five seconds for the witty “his magazine, maybe. GQ.”
In a DVR-enabled trigger happy world, the simple placement of the GQ logo in a corner would at least deliver some element of brand awareness during the build up and it wouldn’t ruin the “joke” either because, of course, all GQ readers possess each and every one of the traits listed in the spot. Or at least they aspire to.
The concept though, albeit nothing new, is a workable one. The perfect man doesn’t exist. Everyone knows this. Even so, many men want to be as “perfect” as they can possibly be and GQ is one tool that can help them achieve that goal. The execution of this concept by DDB Paris, though, falls flat. It’s like a fifth grader telling the same long-winded joke over and over again expecting it to be funny each time which, of course, it’s not.
Having effectively trashed the spot, it’s entirely conceivable our hyper-fast, over-stimulated, attention deficit disorder-addled, Americanized viewpoint of things can’t appreciate the beauty of a slow build such as the one in this commercial. Unlike many American commercials which deliver their jokes with the grace of a sledgehammer, this decidedly slower paced effort takes it’s time parsing out its increasingly goofy scenarios until the message settles in soothingly like a cup of afternoon tea.
The song selection? Will leave that to you to analyze.
