The first commercial ever in which Nike and Adidas live peacefully in co-existence, we thought. Nope, not true. It is Greenpeace that wants to educate us about these love brands. It’s a good thing that Marco Della Coletta and Zoe D’Amaroclearly (Godmother) can show off their skills while helping Greenpeace in its fight for a better world. But we don’t really get it. That is, we do get that Nike and Adidas are playing with toxic polluters. But why create a brand film – with breakdancers, a Snoop Dog look alike, and a logo that communicates water in Chinese – that makes Nike and Adidas look über cool, if you want to make these same brands look uncool? The e-mail accompanying this “cross media campaign” explained it wasn’t made with the help of any big agency. Well, it’s good to see that the good old advertising agencies can still have added value in getting an apt message across.

Wieden+Kennedy Amsterdam created this sympathetic 2,5 minute mini documentary centered around a talent scout, Alexander Shpakov – of whom the name strangely enough remains unknown – and talent Andriy Shevchenko, who was discovered 17 years ago in Kiev. Together the two look back at the moment when Shevchenko – who still plays in Kiev for Dynamo – was discovered and discuss what it takes to stand out on the pitch. The film is part of ‘The Chance,’ which is a global football talent search for youg amateur footballers that want to take their game to a professional level – which sounds like an earlier Nike theme; ‘Take it to the next level’. Against the backdrop of the brand new follow up of Nike ‘Write the future’, ‘My time is now’ (created by W+K London) the film is very subtle, even sober. Through a Facebook app, you can sign up to join a team that will go on a global tour to train and play with some of the world’s best teams. 16 talents from 50 countries will eventually get selected. Nike as a talent scout; sounds like a good plan.

We received an e-mail from Audentiy’s Niels den Otter about a new Nike film – featuring Moussa Coly, who lives and plays in Pigalle for Goutte D’or – for which he did the music and sound design. Den Otter: “My inspiration for designing the sound in this film comes from how I see Paris; a city full of contrasts: stylized shops and fashion mecca, while at the same time a melting pot of different races, tough neighbourhoods, and street culture. That’s why I chose for harsh, realistic sounds in a stylized way. I listened to ‘The Weeknd‘ and used a deep and ominous bass with a very slow pace, steadily becoming somewhat softer with the help of the floating and vibrant Prophet synthesizer. I made it all build up to the climax of the question: “For whom do you play?” and then made it dissolve in the echo and its delay“. The film searches for a position that celebrates both the super star as well as the man in the street – something we saw before in the Copa Barrio commercials made for Nike by W+K. It was created by Stephane Ashpool and produced by Marc Madeleyn at Cake Film, directed by the young and upcoming director Paul Geusebroek – known for directing Dutch music videos for bands like The jeugd van tegenwoordig – and shot by Menno Mans.

Wherever you are in the city, you’re favourite sport should always be with you is Nike’s thought behind this dressed up ad ‘peperbus’ (pepper mill) that can be used as a sports attribute – click on image to see the entire picture. Here and here two more. There’s a URL on each peperbus that refers to a short film in which a successful athlete talks about his/her sport (in Dutch) and demonstrates how to use the outdoor furniture. Another great example of a medium turning into the message. Created by Undog, Goedbezig! Producties, and Centercom.

Picture: ECD’s W+K Amsterdam Mark Bernath (left) and Eric Quennoy (middle), mainly responsible for Wieden+Kennedy’s huge success in Cannes and Enrico Balleri from Nike, just after the award ceremony last Saturday. What a great closing night for the Amsterdam agency it was. Nike Write the future scored seven more Lions – earlier in the week it already won gold in Cyber. At the most important award night the Amsterdam agency first of all won the prestigious Grand Prix in film. It was a very close finish with Puma’s ‘After hours athlete’ as jury chair Tony Granger (CCO Y&R) explained at the press conference. After a lengthy discussion he asked the jury to put all the rational arguments aside and vote from the heart. This gave Nike the final push. Nike also won five Lions in Film craft: two Gold (Editing and Script), two Silver (Production and Sound), and one bronze (CG). And the seventh Lion, Gold in Integrated, proved that the campaign didn’t just have a pretty face. And then Heineken; for this other power brand W+K won five Lions in Film and Film craft. Four for The Entrance: Film: Gold and Bronze (interactive). Film craft: Gold and Silver (Direction and Sound Design). One Lion went to The Date – more or less the sequel of The Entrance. It won bronze in Film. This brought the grand total for Wieden+Kennedy to 13 (!) Lions. Together with all the Lions that Portland won for Old Spice, W+K must easily be the most awarded independent network in the world. Two more Amsterdam Lions went to MINI ‘Flow‘ (Silver in Film craft) by BSUR and one to Volkswagen’s ‘Old Lady’ (Bronze in Film) by DDB. All in all Amsterdam (officially) won 25 Lions, 8 (!) more than last year.

With 13 shortlist nominations in film and 7 in film craft, Amsterdam should be able to win some more Lions tomorrow night. Of all these nominations 4 go to Nike ‘Write the future’, 3 to Heineken’s ‘The Entrance’, and one to Heineken’s ‘The Date’, which adds up to an impressive 8 film (craft) nominations for Wieden+Kennedy Amsterdam. Write the future also has a nomination for Titanium (integrated), though this case was sent in by Nike. BSUR also does well with 4 nominations for MINI Countryman’s ‘Flow’. Philips’ ‘Wake up the town’ by Tribal DDB has 3 film nominations. Other film nominations go to Volkswagen (DDB), Centraal Beheer (DDB) – we personally liked this more subtle Centraal Beheer film a lot better – De Bijenkorf (Selmore), IDFA X-ray eyes (TBWA) – a very smart film – and the beautiful Sire film ‘Marked for life‘ (180). We’ll keep our fingers crossed!