Hands Down, This Is The Most Successful Commercial Of 2013

Hands Down, This Is The Most Successful Commercial Of 2013

I’m calling it. This commercial for Volvo Trucks that came out today is the best commercial of 2013. What makes it – or other commercial shoots - so successful? Beautiful, simple ideas, a great concept, seamless execution, a bit of good old nostalgia and a pinch of the unexpected all mix beautifully to give us 70 seconds of pure brilliance. With four eight twelve twenty four thirty million views and counting, let's take a look and see why this ad has been so successful. 

For those of us of a certain generation, we will remember the king of kickboxing, Jean Claude Van Damme, from his many action films like “Bloodsport” and “Kickboxer”, and his insane ability to do the split kicks. It’s what he became known for. Volvo played to this brilliantly today with their demonstration of their truck's technical excellence in their new ad, by combining man and machine, in a statement piece that simply says “engineering excellence”.

The opening is a shocker for those of us who still remember Jean Claude from back in his hey day. He looks so old! But by the time the end of the commercial comes up, we’re touched by how he “still has the old magic”. It’s shot so simply and beautifully, all on a one shot take that starts in on a close up, smoothly tracks out to a wide and then tracks off to the side so we are left with a super strong, beautiful composition as the commercial ends.

Like the best commercials, we are left with a sense of awe, wonder, and amazement at what we've just seen - it is memorable. In an age and time where our attention spans are measured in fractions of seconds, this commercial just does everything right. As soon as I watched it, I went straight back and watched it again. It was that good. Today, a successful commercial is one that goes viral, that gets us talking, and makes us want to watch it again. The "stickiness" of commercials - how long we remember and talk about them for - is what makes them successful. Will this sell more Volvo trucks? Time will tell, but as far as a successful, sticky commercial goes, this one is pure gold.

They also filmed a little funny behind the scenes piece (albeit with little to no technical BTS information, it does help set the scene for the actual commercial very nicely).

It just goes to show – success isn’t something impossible or unfathomable or insanely out of reach, but it is about having the right ingredients, mixed properly together and carefully executed. It's about focusing on keeping things simple, not getting unnecessarily twisted up in all sorts of complexity for the sake of it. A simple concept, something that is well thought out, planned properly, shot simply and beautifully, and then has a drop of nostalgia and a little surprise added to the mix provides the basis for an amazing, heart stopping piece of visual media.

David Geffin's picture

David is a full time photographer, videographer and video editor based in New York City. Fashion, portraiture and street photography are his areas of focus. He enjoys stills and motion work in equal measure, with a firm belief that a strong photographic eye will continue to help inform and drive the world of motion work.

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Previous comments

chuck norris did the same stunt, only using planes, flying backwards!

I totally call BS, I like JCVD but there is no way!! he started with the splits and the truck drove forward.

2 different trucks...folks they are selling product here. Why wouldn't they want to use 2 different versions? Sure it is easier for the stunt, maybe. This has brought Volvo to a household name again. Something it hasn't had in ages.

Remember "boxy but safe"? Jean not falling sends that subtle message again.

Its a great commercial, emotional connection, simplistic, well done. Its also all CGI and post production and not a real live shot. If you look at his left food, you can see they forgot to remove one of the track points they used to track him in the shot.

What a lot of bull. Even Dishan saw thru this. I have been driving for 20 + YEARS. tHEY ARE DRIVING FORWARD. AND playing it to make it look like they are reversing. Volvo taking their consumers for idiots. More reason to buy a Mercedes.

I actually do believe that they are driving backwards, and that's why I think they used one rigid long wheelbase truck together with the semi trailer :-)

Even more Bullcrap. Dishan, picked up that the truck on the left is a rigid.........COME ON Volvo.

How is it successful? I am not the least bit interested in buying a Volvo truck, nor will I remember in a week that it is about the trucks and not Van Damme.

Wow!

fake

JCVD is from another planet.

.

Have you seen the Rod Ford parody?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=NRdXOr-uYlU

.

Vovlo has the toughest side mirrors!

Assuming there is no trickery here, JCVD and the whole crew, drivers and production is just amazing…

Simply awesome! Besides the use of different trucks for technical purposes, they are able to advertise both models in one commercial. Great job!

Ad of the year? Uh, no. It's entertaining, yes, and it's memorable, yes, because it's so ridiculous. JCVD doing splits between trucks to Enya with pseudo-new age babble? It's hilarious in the way it's taking itself far too seriously.

If I remember correctly, from working on TV and movie productions, car commercials are not allowed to be "faked" and what I mean is they cannot perform maneuvers that the vehicle is unable to do in regular circumstances. From that experience I would say this is not faked and is BADASS!

Here is the trick. They ran the film backwards, they put him in between the trucks apart and they drove forward coming together. Although I will give the director a lot for creativity. Wish I would thought of it. This separates the pros from the rest of us.

That was truly amazing, and very well done. I loved the prelude piece as well. What a great commercial. All I could say was "Wow", before I watched it again. :-)

whoowww.. dahsyat... unbeliveable...

I loved the bromance in that second video

Wow...wow indeed.

Annnnd I'm pregnant.

His movie JCVD from 2008 is a great film. Everyone should check it out very different from most of his roles. Has a great 6 minute monologue where he breaks the fourth wall and talks to the audience.

Would have been better with Jackie chan

Who thinks this video is backwards!! I mean he musty have started with the split and then came up again!!! Isn't that the easiest way to film something like this? Also watch the sun (unless it's a sunrise) is rising! Maybe... :)

does anyone know the name of the music plss???

Enya -- Only Time

"... we are left with a sense of awe, wonder, and amazement ..." Holy god, English standards have plummeted since the internet!!!

Closing in on 42 million views. I just canNOT get enough of this ad. I wish they would put this on TV already. Oh, and I love your writeup on it - explains exactly how I feel, except for the 'he looks so old' part. He's like fine wine, he ages well.

Dear Volvo, Challenge accepted

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwDHd8lSEtU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9U-LpQdP3P4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHRaQr0KSFE

MR. AJAY DEVGAN of India has been doing this for 20 years...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9U-LpQdP3P4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHRaQr0KSFE

MR. AJAY DEVGAN of India has been doing this for 20 years...

Awe inspiring!

My first thought during watching this was that it had to have been filmed with the trucks traveling forward not in reverse and then just reversing the playback. Is there any proof they were actually going in reverse?

Successful and popular are two very different things. In my day job as an agency producer and former Head Of Production on the Toyota account, I can safely say that.

"isn't impossible or unfathomable or insanely out of reach" - I think this ad was all of those things and that's exactly why it worked. Because they did it anyway. No CG just giant balls of steal, a big pay cheque and some seriously well designed trucks.

It was good commercial but CGI all the way.

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