New Fiat 500

The new Fiat 500 is available! It was presented yesterday in Torino. I love this advertisement.

UPDATE Aug 19,2007. In order to make justice to the comments of Martina, I embed a mashup of the fiat ad. This is for the v-day: on September 8, 2007, Italians will say to Italian politicians “Enough is enough”. It will be an interesting day.

I think I’ll embed also a video from the recent history of Italy just as a reminder: April 30, 1993, Friday, 18.00. A mob gathered in largo Febo in front of the hotel Raphael waiting for Craxi. When he exits, people start throwing at him coins and other objects. Craxi was one of the biggest politicians in Italy and one of the biggest thieves in Italy.

8 thoughts on “New Fiat 500

  1. paolo Post author

    Yep, indeed! But I like the fact it underlines the “Italianity” of it. The Nuovo Cinema Paradiso, the “it belongs to all of us”, … I really like it.
    Thanks for the comment! What are you up at the moment?

  2. paolo Post author

    Hi truesmile!
    Of course you can say so ;-)

    I think the adv is clever, it is very similar to the apple’s very old one. In that case “good” people were used to sell a computer.
    What I think is clever (but again nothing new) is the fact you are not speaking about the product, never, the product is just mentioned in the last frame. You can easily take the adv and replace the last frame with another product, say, Parmigiano Reggiano? Or the last hospital created by Emergency? Or the fact Italy won the football championship or Coppa America? Would it be wrong in that case? Should nobody be allowed to use, for instance, Martin Luther King in advertisement?
    And frankly, the fact you feel like commenting is already a success for an adv, whose goal is also to have people speak about the product.

    The aspect I didn’t like, if any, is the fact I think it tries to leverage on the nationalistic aspect, on the Italianism, if I can call it so.
    But I like other people have opinions different from mines! ;-)

  3. truesmile

    Of course me too i like other people having different opinions from mine, i didn’t want to convince u or anybody. :)
    by a commercial point of u, an adv is a success if u speak abt the product, not abt the adv. by an advertising point of u view, of course: it’s a good job.
    the leverage is not only on nationalistic aspect, is in general abt the idea of good and bad, the idea it MUST be somethign bad or good for eveybody. Yeah, ok, i’m absolutly AGAINST BR, for instance, yet that’s not the point.
    Then the fact to put gandhi or martin luther king in an adv…i guess they will revolt if they were alive, don’t u think so? first, cause many people know them as symbols, icon i said, and not by their lifes or thoughs. (our era is wonderful in oversimplifing) second, why USE the good to sell?
    why not, u ask. that’s the point: we are used to use eveything, in the same way we have inflationated picture of big-empty-belly kids for humanitarian campaigns or similar.
    Of course it’s a discourse which goes far behind this adv and can be regarded as antimodernist or whatever. It’s my though anyway.
    (ie: do u remember the Telecom adv, the back and white one with gandhi? anoher perfect example, and more paradoxal maybe, since gandhi was absolutly against technology…)
    uhm, do u see what happens when u let me speak?
    thanks for the space ;)

    c ya guy, enjoy august

  4. paolo Post author

    Che Guevara is on a lot of t-shirts and flags. I guess he will revolt if he was alive as well.
    If I understood correctly there are 2 points in your comments:
    1) using this dichotomy of good vs bad is dangerous.
    2) using people who are widely known as “good people”.

    About 1) I might agree with you, somehow.
    About 2) I think every ad maker (or film maker, like anybody nowadays with a simple computer and camera) is free to use symbols as she prefers. For me, they can use Gandhi or Hitler. But I see your point, I didn’t like the Telecom campaign, I found irriverent to use Gandhi for such a poor message. But here I find it different. I find the message inspiring. Would you had a different reaction if it would have been just a short movie without the last frames about 500? Just a poetic movie, not about selling but about communicating an emotion? Is the fact that this is an adv that troubles you? I’m asking these questions because I don’t know my answers actually…
    Anyway, you should come to visit me in Trento and then we’ll speak this out in detail, in front of a cold beer, of course.

  5. paolo Post author

    Martina, I embedded a mashup of the fiat ad. This is for the v-day: on September 8, 2007, Italians will say to Italian politicians “Enough is enough”. It will be an interesting day.

  6. truesmile

    dear pahuly, thanks. maybe it’s not what i asked, but u got the point: u can use it for whatever, and i prefer using it for the v-day.
    i’ll be demostrating, on september 8th.
    hope u too.
    take care (keep the beer in the fridge, soon or later i’ll come to trento ;) )

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