The document summarizes and compares the hot dog parody advertisement "The Dogfather" to other well-known advertisements. It argues that "The Dogfather" ad takes a different, more gritty approach than food ads by M&S by parodying the mafia film The Godfather. It notes similarities to Fox's biscuits ads that also use a mafia theme. The document contends that the parody and gritty style will appeal more to male audiences. It aims for the ad to stick in people's minds like familiar Coca-Cola Christmas ads. Overall, the document asserts that the unconventional parody approach will attract more viewers than standard food advertisements.
2. Our Adverts are different to most adverts you
see or hear on TV, internet, and radio as it is a
parody of a famous film with a twist. We took
the idea of the Godfather films and put our own
twist on a famous scene. We changed the name
to The Dogfather as it suits our product, a hot
dog. In most food related adverts you will see
companies making up their own adverts and
with their own variation, but in our advert we
use a well-known film and basically make it our
own.
3. Compared to adverts like the Marks & Spencer adverts which
show gourmet style food in a luxury manor with a female
voiceover, I think this is more suited to all ranges of audience
members from children to adults.
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHFKE6PD_6U). Ours is more
gritty and targeted towards the older male audience members as
they will know about The Godfather and will understand our
parody more. Due to the fact that our product is a hotdog and the
theme is mafia style I believe that the male audience will be the
ones who watch our advert the most as it suites them more.
4. • The M&S adverts use a seductive voice and a
song to entice the audience and to bring them in
more and for the audience member to not get
bored while watching the advert similarly our
advert starts with the theme song of The
Godfather, this would draw in the audience
members who have watched The Godfather
before and for people who haven’t watched The
Godfather before they will still have heard of it
and the fact that our advert opens with our logo
‘The Dogfather’ it sparks curiosity and makes
them want to watch more.
5. The fox’s biscuits adverts are the ones that have the most similarity to
our adverts as it has the same sort of concept. The panda has a mafia
feel to it with the way he speaks and ours in the way we use the parody
to Godfather and the way we have the main actor speak in the advert.
Like our advert this advert’s theme of mafia draws in the male
audience more than any other audience member.
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5OoEm9Qad4) Alongside
speech our advert also relates to the Fox’s biscuits through symbolism.
Our advert uses the actual Dogfather and he is the symbol of the
gangster mafia theme and in the fox’s biscuits adverts there symbol is
the panda and the way he is represented as more mafia type person.
Also the fact that you don’t expect a mafia themed panda to be
associated with biscuits you don’t expect The Godfather to be expected
with Hotdogs and I believe this is what brings in the audience more as
it causes a sense of curiosity.
6. However in the Fox’s biscuits
adverts the Panda is
American and says “from
England Fox’s biscuits” kind
of bringing the American
feel to England, in our
adverts the main focus is the
product which is a hotdog
and you normally do not see
adverts to do with hotdogs
in England and more in the
states, so by doing this I
believe we have widen our
audience range.
7. Another advert that is similar to ours is the Bird’s
Eye polar bear advert.
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JeZeu8v7un
M&feature=endscreen&NR=1) This advert has the
same gritty feel to its like ours with the way the
protagonist is portrayed through his speech. With
the use of this character I believe that birds eye
have created a character that can sort of control
the viewers as he gives direct instructions, also I
believe that by being gritty and straight to the point
it relates to other television advert genres that we
are in and sort of relates to our advert as well.
8. As well as this our adverts also use a lot of repetition
through the theme of mafia our radio sequence and our
second advert all use this gritty mafia theme through
the voice of the protagonist same as the Birds Eye
adverts as they carry on making new adverts although a
lot has changed in them they still keep the polar bear
and his gritty voice, I believe this sort of builds a
relationship with the viewer and the protagonist as
they’ve seen this character so many times and to
change this would result in less views.
9. The Coca Cola adverts at Christmas stick with the same song and
theme each year at Christmas and this has stuck in people’s
heads as they remember the advert from a year ago it kind of
makes a relationship with the viewer as it comes on for a limited
time but still is the same as the year before so people remember
it. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogetBqMgau0)
In our advert we aim for it to have
the same effect as The Coca Cola
advert, we want it to stick in
people’s minds and for people to
remember it even a year later.
10. Our adverts look the same as professional adverts
through the way we’ve used music to draw in viewers
and the way we’ve come up with a tagline to stick in
the audiences head. I believe this is what an advert is
designed to do, stick in the head of the audience
member, by doing these things I believe we have
accomplished this.
The reasons why we have decided to move away from
the conventions of a normal advert is too basically
make something new for audience members. As an
audience member myself I’ve seen many adverts who
use the same ideas and nothing really challenges that
idea of a advert but by making a parody I believe that
we’ve broken through that barrier of a standard
advert and this makes for more viewers and for a
better overall piece.
