Everyone with any opinion about advertising (which, in this hyper-mediated world, is pretty much anyone) has at LEAST a half-aware understanding of the ability of advertising to affect their lives. Czech Dream is a movie about just that, as two student filmmakers design an ad campaign for a product that doesn't even exist, a hypermarket (which is, from what I saw in the movie, sort of a mix between a wholesale market and a supermarket) that advertises its opening day by saying such things as, "Don't come!" and "Don't spend!" Two thousand people arrive anyway.
This documentary is most effective in its complete simplicity. The filmmakers and crew take no time trying to hide their judgment or view from the movie--you can even see the mics, lighting set ups, other cameramen, and so on--because the idea here is NOT to create a so-called objective documentary but to show much more directly and personally the power of advertising over people. This power is something everyone perceives, but not as many people really believe in, until something like this occurs and two thousand people are left on a field with nothing in it but a banner.
Czech Dream is full of wonderful details. Vit and Filip spend little time detailing the actual process, focusing more on the message that the ads are trying to create, and allows most of the film's time to settle on people's comments about it. The self-serving dialog of the advertisers ("Oh, I think this is a horrible thing, but we're professionals and so we'll do it. It's like a doctor who has to save a rapist" "I like being an advertiser, you know, I like going out with my friends and knowing that I am the one that moves the world" "Filmmakers lie, advertisers don't lie") is well foiled by the reactions of the crowd of people who actually arrived, whose opinions range from "Hey, I know what this is, this is two people trying to get us outside for once! Let's have a picnic!" to "I'm going to take you to court for this!" and who, amazingly, take very little time in connecting the event to its political meaning (one that the filmmakers didn't really intend).
One thing about this documentary I find particularly interesting, though, is how much it focuses on "Czech" aspects of it, even though there's nothing besides that one word that makes it any different from any other ad campaign. The fake hypermarket is called "Czech Dream" to create a sense of consumerist paradise, of course, but most of the reactions of everyone involves the idea that they were lead to be tricked BECAUSE they were Czech (which some people are angry about, others amused), when in fact a situation like this can occur anywhere advertising of this type exists (everywhere? Maybe not in the third world, but that's contestable as well). Of course, here in the United States, if anyone did this, they'd get sued or something (Americans have no sense of humor). But still, the message is surprisingly universal despite how personalized and small the two filmmakers tried to make it.
--PolarisDiB
This documentary is most effective in its complete simplicity. The filmmakers and crew take no time trying to hide their judgment or view from the movie--you can even see the mics, lighting set ups, other cameramen, and so on--because the idea here is NOT to create a so-called objective documentary but to show much more directly and personally the power of advertising over people. This power is something everyone perceives, but not as many people really believe in, until something like this occurs and two thousand people are left on a field with nothing in it but a banner.
Czech Dream is full of wonderful details. Vit and Filip spend little time detailing the actual process, focusing more on the message that the ads are trying to create, and allows most of the film's time to settle on people's comments about it. The self-serving dialog of the advertisers ("Oh, I think this is a horrible thing, but we're professionals and so we'll do it. It's like a doctor who has to save a rapist" "I like being an advertiser, you know, I like going out with my friends and knowing that I am the one that moves the world" "Filmmakers lie, advertisers don't lie") is well foiled by the reactions of the crowd of people who actually arrived, whose opinions range from "Hey, I know what this is, this is two people trying to get us outside for once! Let's have a picnic!" to "I'm going to take you to court for this!" and who, amazingly, take very little time in connecting the event to its political meaning (one that the filmmakers didn't really intend).
One thing about this documentary I find particularly interesting, though, is how much it focuses on "Czech" aspects of it, even though there's nothing besides that one word that makes it any different from any other ad campaign. The fake hypermarket is called "Czech Dream" to create a sense of consumerist paradise, of course, but most of the reactions of everyone involves the idea that they were lead to be tricked BECAUSE they were Czech (which some people are angry about, others amused), when in fact a situation like this can occur anywhere advertising of this type exists (everywhere? Maybe not in the third world, but that's contestable as well). Of course, here in the United States, if anyone did this, they'd get sued or something (Americans have no sense of humor). But still, the message is surprisingly universal despite how personalized and small the two filmmakers tried to make it.
--PolarisDiB
