Some French ads

1. Some French ads

2. The purpose of this ad is to sell a cellphone and a mobile subscription. The titlecouldbetranslatedlikethis : « This is Florent, a golden boy » Theyusedbrightcolors and famous French athlete (Florent and Laure Manaudou). There also a reference to the relatively new great performance with golden to refer to the golden medal won at the Olympicsgame and, in the upper right-hand corner of the phone, thereis a photo of Florent Manaudou and the caption L’Equipe.fr*. « L’Equipe » is a famous sport magazine and website.

3. This is to advertise a event : 80 concerts during 2 days. The purposeis to fightagainst AIDS (that’s the meaning of the small black square, abose the ‘o’ of Solidays). This ad wasfound in a newspapercalled 20 minutes*. Île de France (at the bottom) stand for the French region (it’swhere Paris is). A lot of people read 20 minutes but it’s not a very good newspaper, it’sjust free and distributed in the metro and someother public places.

4. This is an ad founded in a magazine. There isn’tmuch to say about it. The smallparagraphat the end is to promotesomepricereduction and somereservations. The slogan « Profiter, changer, économiser » (at the bottom of the ad) couldbetranslatedlikethis : « Profiting, changing, saving.

5. This ad promote a magic show, wejustcanread the place and dates were the show willtake place. TF1 (bottomleft-hand corner) is one of the first TV channel in France. RFM (bottom right-hand corner) is a big radio station. The other logos are not wellknown.

6. This ad is for a tour in France. In the bottom right-hand corner, the red logo stand for RTL2, a famous radio station (rock and pop-rock music) in France,

7. « At this price, I’m back in France » In this ad, Virgin Mobile uses the actuality to promote their low-price offer. In fact, it clearly refers to Gerard Depardieu’s recent tax exile in Belgium and Russia, which has been particularly mediatized…

8. « For Christmas, the best gift is to come back home alive » Road safety has a huge importance in France – many shocking ads are made to prevent road accidents, like this damaged car in Paris, last December. Even a website (rentreenvie.fr) has been created to give advice about how to deal with parties.

9. « THERE IS NO DANGER - Concerning GMOs we can not stand back enough yet» This ad has around 5 years old. GMOs were very contested at this time in France, which explains such striking ads against them, comparing transgenic corn with a gun. (GMOs are still contested, but we don’t hear about it any more…)

10. Ads for condoms or other sex products are sometimes quite rude, like this ad for a « very effective lubricant » by Manix. When we see this picture for the first time, we don’t realize what it represents. But soon, we understand where (how?) this women is sitting…

11. But sex in adsismuch more surprisingwhenwhatisadvertised has nothing to do withsex. For exemple, this coffee machine clearly has the shape of a male genitalorgan. The associatedtextis not lessstrange- quite perverse indeed: « Black Senseo. To bewitchmum, thereisnothinglike black magic »

12. This is an old commercial (1998 with prices in francs) from a magazine. Here, the commercial indicates that a sentence can be applied to two entities: a car and a woman wearing a helmet. The text reads: “To have a [dreamy body] and to feel [indestructible]. The text below clearly describes the car’s features but some words are also clearly used to refer to a female body (for example: “great curves” when referring to the body or “inflatable cushion” when referring to the airbag). The purpose here is to make the car attractive while emphasizing on the safety features of the car (hence the helmet). Though the comparison between the woman wearing a helmet and the car is questionable in terms of “safety”.

13. This car commercial is very different from what we would usually find in modern advertisement. The car is neither shown in motion nor in a favorably attractive location. The car, being illegally parked, got its four tires immobilized, proving that it needs that much to be pinned down. Hence the simple and only sentence of this ad: “Toyota RAV 4 four-wheel drive”. Indeed, usually, one of these is enough to unable motion so it’s clearly overkill to use four. This is just to prove a point. Also, doing something illegal right in front of the prohibiting sign is typically French… Commercials usually don’t condone committing infractions, even if it’s in order to make a point.

14. On the left: “I dream that one day, cars will leave a mark on the Earth as big as a ship leaves a mark on the ocean” by Ellen MacArthur. On the right: “To reduce our impact on the planet, this is the Renault eco-commitment” This commercial is very interesting in that they made a very clear parallel between the two pictures: the catamaran leaves the exact same pattern (road included) as on the picture on the right. Notice that even the road behind the car disappears to the point it is not noticeable at the bottom of the picture so as to respect the symmetry. Finally, the colors have also been carefully chose: the big blue for the ocean and the bountiful green for the Earth (->green energies…) Last but not least, the “eco²” logo is found on both pictures showing that no matter where, Renault’s “eco-commitment” may be found…

15. This is yet another ad from a 1998 magazine. This ad is also rather unusual as the character depicted is rather sleep deprived, which makes him unattractive. This does not seem to correspond to the commercial’s goal, which is to offer price reductions on some of their product. In truth, it seems that the picture is in accordance with the text in white “Am I dreaming or is it my eyes?” While it is true that the picture is focusing on the eyes (the business man is trying really hard to keep them open), depicting a sleep deprived person is, in my opinion, not necessarily a good way to show that the offer is genuine… On another note, the big red Q (which represents the brand) might actually add to the sentence in white to make “Am I dreaming or is it just my eyes?” This could alter slightly the meaning and my interpretation but I think it is a bit far fetched for an ad that is supposed to catch the reader’s attention in an instant…

16. This commercial is about Duracell batteries. The text in black reads: “New Duracell Ultra that make lamps, toys and rabbits last even longer.” This is the type of ad that doesn’t work if left alone because we don’t really understand what the rabbit is all about. In fact, this commercial was accompanied by TV ads depicting the same rabbit doing all sorts of sports activity while being powered by a battery (a link to such videos is probably given in the internet link given at the top of the ad…). In this commercial, the best way to make the reader understand “sports activity” is to stop the motion. Finally, to emphasize the “Ultra”, why not make the rabbit jump above city buildings like it was flying? Only one thing doesn’t seem to work well: how do you convey “battery duration”, which is the main point of the ad? By adding “no alkaline battery lasts longer” (text in white) at the bottom of course! Note that in France, it is illegal to name other brands to compare with, which is why ads usually say they are “the best”, instead of “better than‘”.

17. Contact information • From SFR ad to Mark Knopfler ad: romain.fleurisson@etu.emse.fr • From Virgin mobile ad to Senseo ad damien.heriveaux@etu.emse.fr • From Honda ad to Duracell ad: mathieu.snollaerts@etu.emse.fr