In the fluid, constantly changing world of viral video, Cundari is currently number one with a “Bullet.”
The Toronto agency’s “Bullet” video in support of the BMW M5 has garnered nearly three million views since its online debut, June 22. In addition to the standard automotive and advertising sites, the spot has been featured on mainstream sites including Toronto Life, Fast Company and even rapper 50 Cent’s ThisIs50.com.
“It has gone bananas online,” said Cundari’s chief creative officer Brent Choi, fresh off a pair of gold Lions in Cannes last week for the “Pain Squad” app for Sick Kids Hospital in Toronto. “It’s gone beyond automotive or advertising to the mainstream.”
Shot on location at the famed Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah—where numerous land-speed records have been set—the video opens with the sound of an M5 revving its engine before the luxury sedan shoots out of a concrete pipe like a bullet from a gun.
The two-minute video combines high-speed driving footage with super slow-motion footage of the car hurtling through a series of obstacles, including an oversized apple—an apparent reference to the late Dr. Harold Edgerton’s iconic photo—and giant water-filled balloons. The slow-motion footage is accompanied by audio of Beethoven’s piano concerto No. 5.
As with an online video created for BMW last year, the “Bullet” spot has sparked considerable online debate about whether the footage is real or heavily reliant upon special effects.
Choi was coy when asked about the use of CGI in the video. “We talk about art only coming to life when people discuss it and engage with it,” he said. “If we were to deconstruct the piece we would end the conversation and people wouldn’t be able to engage with the film as deeply.
“We love the fact that people are debating what’s real and how we did it, and that’s part of the viral aspect of the whole piece,” he said.
Created over two months, the “Bullet” video is housed on the luxury automaker’s YouTube channel and is being promoted through a homepage takeover on the video site and out-of-home advertising in both Toronto and Montreal.
The media buy by Media Experts is intended to ensure high visibility in both online and offline channels where auto enthusiasts spend significant time said a press release. The buy features domination tactics across multiple channels.
While the M5 is the vehicle featured in the online video, the overall campaign supports five new M-series models debuting this year, said Choi. The client brief was to create a campaign that showcased the M5’s luxuriousness and high performance.
“You can go to the opera in it and then race down the Nürburgring at record speeds,” he said. “The real challenge is communicating both of these things while being as innovative as possible, just like the vehicle.” There was also an unwritten challenge, said Choi, to live up to last year’s work which was also shortlisted at the Cannes Lions.
