Greenpeace - Car Advert - 7

Charity: Greenpeace

Campaign: What does your car say about you?

Greenpeace are trying to enforce their ideology that the cars that emit the most harmful emissions can lead to people looking down on you for how bad the car is to the environment. Plenty of people swear heavily behind the man’s back, make gestures to him and try (not so subtly) to drop hints of how bad of a person he is, which tells the audience that people will talk down about you if you use a car that is harmful to the environment, and you look like a bad person for using the car despite the fact you know it is bad for the atmosphere. 

The wide range of characters in the advert allows the audience to grasp at what the message is, until the very end scene, the audience are wondering why he’s a “W@nker” or a “Pr*ck” because that’s all the characters are saying about him. We wonder why is the person portrayed to be bad, because he doesn’t do anything bad to them during the advert. It’s a clever way of advertising, the audience are engaged to the advert for the full length, to find out why he’s being described the way he is by his colleagues. The snarls he receives, and the subtly dropped swear words to him makes us feel sorry for him, like he’s being bullied for no apparent reason, but the end scene drops all the previous feelings we had for the man, once we realise the car he drives. It makes the audience think about the car they drive, and whether or not people are talking down about the car they are driving. The setting is very easily recognisable, an office, whether or not the audience have worked in an office, we can engage to it because it is a very recognizable work place, which can suit the “Mainstreamer”, who likes to recognize specific places from media texts. As the mainstreamer is the most popular group in Young and Rubicam’s 4 C’s, the advert has targeted a wide audience with the advert. The camera angles in the advert are usually medium shots, which allows the audience to see both the facial expressions and the body language when the characters meet the man they are targeting. This means that the audience can see a clear view of how the characters are interpreting him, so they don’t miss any key parts of the advert. Close up shots aren’t needed, as the expression on their faces isn’t the only thing the encoders want the audience to see, a very clever way of advertising. 

The use of humour, and reward and punishment, and a slight use of shock tactics is used in the advert to target the audience and make them want to engage to the advert. The humour is when the characters are using explicit words behind the man’s back, something that the audience can all admit to doing, which is why humour is used. Reward and Punishment is probably the most important line of appeal in the advert, if you use a car that is not environmentally friendly, then you will most likely be mocked by your work colleagues, but driving a car that doesn’t emit harmful emissions will mean you will be respected among your colleagues, and you can fit into the work force. Shock tactics is mildly used, with the woman spitting into the tea, which is disgusting, and the use of obscene swear words can make some members of the audience shocked with the words they are using. 

The advert is great at making the audience want wo watch until the end, the unnecessary swearing makes people want to watch until the very end of the advert, because naturally the audience want to know why they are unnecessarily swearing at him, and spitting in his drink. The advert has a simple message – don’t drive a car that emits harmful emissions, otherwise you won’t be liked, or respected, by the colleagues in work. It makes the audience think about whether or not the car they drive emits harmful emissions, and whether the drink they are drink has a mouthful of spit in, people become aware of the charity, and the more people aware, the less cars that emit harmful emissions will be emitted into the atmosphere.