Opposing Views

Wieden+Kennedy London knows how to advertise for Honda. Last year, they took the 120-second spot to a higher art form with “Hands”, which took home the award for Broadcast Television at The One Show’s Automobile Advertising of the Year Awards. This year, creative director Scott Dungate and his team upped the ante with an interactive film that shows off both sides of the Honda Type R. In the film, two stories play out at the same time in alternate realities, and the viewer can switch between the two for a seamless, story experience. We talked with Dungate about this bold project and what it took to pull it off.
 
Where did this idea come from?
 
We've done a lot of thinking on Honda the last year. One strategy was to tackle the misconception that Honda is just safe and reliable head on. To call out the fact Honda has an “other side,” one that is born from a high performance, racing pedigree. All Honda cars have this racing DNA in them, but the Type R is the pure embodiment of it.
 
Inside the Type R is a +R button that adjusts the suspension and puts the car into race mode. We liked the idea of replicating the feeling of pressing “R” when you drive. From this came the idea of some kind of two-sided story that you could cut between two narratives.
 
How did Honda respond to the concept when it was initially brought up?
 
To sell in the idea we created a prototype using simple driving shots, one on a racetrack the other in the suburbs. Both were hosted on YouTube and ultimately this became the basis of the final design. Through this, Honda could feel the interaction immediately and saw its potential. I don’t think they or even we would have bought into the concept without the demo. And it was also really valuable in sharing the concept with markets and directors.
 
What has the public response been to the film?
 
The response to the film has been amazing. Aside from trending in the first 24 hours we also made it onto the front page of Reddit (who generally hate advertising) and also BuzzFeed. The interactive film received over four million views in less than two weeks and the average time per session was over three minutes—indicating most people watched it more than once. Not only have we had a great reaction to the film in terms of story and craft, but the response to the cars has been really positive too. We’ve seen a real desire for the metal in both Civic and Type R.
 
Where was it filmed? How long did it take to film?
 
The film was shot in Slovenia and Croatia. It took six days to shoot with gruelling, back-to-back day and night shoots. The last day over ran to the following day and we wrapped at 10am. Everyone was quite delirious by that point.
 
Knowing what you know today, what, if anything, would you have done differently?
 
To be honest the process ran pretty smoothly. We worked with some great partners: Somesuch, Stinkdigital, The Mill, Trim, Factory, Bobby Krillic from The Haxan Cloak- not to mention Daniel Wolfe who was excellent. Everyone went above and beyond for the project. It’s rare to say this, but I don’t think I would have done anything differently.
           
Interact with the full spot here