A CONSPIRACY OF GOD-AWFUL COMMERCIALS The Real Story of the Cannes Ad Festival June 22, 2001 By Stefano Hatfield CANNES (AdAgeGlobal) -- There is a conspiracy afoot at this Festival, and it's about time someone blew the lid. The idea seems so bizarre readers may be tempted to side with the organizers who would deny the truth: they don't want you to actually watch the commercials. Photo: SEMEC, Cannes.. Sprawling along a curve of beach, the Palais des Festivals complex can be a difficult place to enter. This seems ridiculous because commercials are what the whole week is about. Theoretically, commercial-watching is the reason so many delegates have paid so much money. Why would festival officials go to all the trouble of collecting millions of dollars in entry fees, take receipt of 6,100 half-inch tapes and then project them in four auditoriums for seven days if they didn't want you to see those spots? Beachs and bars But look around this sun-splashed town and behold the facts. It's not just that they hold the festival in one of the most unfriendly buildings in the world, one harder to get into than a hot New York nightclub, even with the right ID. It's not just that there's a whole mile of beaches and beach restaurants and bars basking in the endless Mediterranean sun on your doorstep. It's not even the parties and lunches and myriad little gatherings on boats and in villas that happen all day and all night. No, the real truth is about what festival organizers fear -- they're afraid that if you really took the time to watch all the commercials you may be so appalled at how bad they are that you'd never come back. That's why there are so many seminars. We've already discussed Photo: SEMEC, Cannes.. Villa restaurants in the hills above Cannes can be hellish distractions from business. that Cannes is Cannes because of the behind-the-scenes deal-making. But the seminars are the pretense at serious business. There are 10 of them, ranging from the god-awful (most of the single agency ones) to the technically impaired (after 48 years, why can't they get the sound right?) to what was actually a really interesting presentation: Budweiser, Stella Artois and Guinness clients explaining how their advertising got so damned good. Those 10 seminars take up at least two days' worth of viewing time in one of the main theaters. Plus, there are now so many more delegates from Korea and Japan and Russia and India and -- well, there aren't any more seats. 5 hours of car commercials It gets worse. Operating on the principle that there should be no quality control at entry level to a) increase income from entries, and b) diminish the chances of anyone being able to withstand it, the car category is five hours long (with a half hour break for lunch). I used to argue that agencies should drag their clients to Cannes and sit them through the car category to make them realize how similar all those ads are. Car ads in Europe were all shot on that winding mountain path in southern Spain; in the U.S. on the salt lake flats of Utah. It is the filmic equivalent of wallpaper in warm earth tones -- as wonderfully tasteful as it is instantly forgettable. Photo: SEMEC, Cannes.. After a hard day of avoiding commercial screenings, attendees can find rest and solace at harbor watering holes with great views. We joined in at film 11/143, an unspeakably crass South African commercial in which a couple is delighted to learn they can't have any children which means they can justify having an Audi TT soft-top. We left after 11/291, an unspeakably crass Brazilian commercial in which a guy who has been informed he has 24 hours to live has the wildest day of his life, only to be told by the doctor he is actually OK. Stunned, the patient recalls that he had a gay sex encounter and therefore leaves his friends behind to visit a shrink. The brand -- in case anyone involved cared -- was Fiat Palio. VW logo as friend Sitting through that two hours of dross churned out globally for Nissan, Fiat, Honda, Renault, Opel and nearly every big U.S. brand, one finds the VW logo becoming a best friend. True, Italian and French advertising is so terrible that it almost manages to make bad VW ads, and true, the German VW ads are -- inevitably -- the most mind-numbingly logical of them all, but thank you VW. Sadly, Cannes audiences just aren't what they used to Previous Stefano Hatfield Columns from Cannes 2001: GERALD LEVIN AND MICKEY MOUSE DO CANNES 'Media Man of Year' Nominee Meets the Ad Hacks DEAL-MAKING, DECENT COFFEE, TOPLESS BATHING Why the Cannes Ad Festival Matters HUMBLE PIE & HAIR SHIRTS ONLINE Cannes' Interactive Advertising Forum a Year Later ADMAN AND MAYOR OF CANNES An Interview With DDB's Bernard Brochand be. Because today's audiences don't see the films, they haven't been transformed into booing, whistling, catcalling animals. No, they are just politely bemused. They suck their teeth occasionally, but only twice did we recall the Cannes of yore. First, there was the absolutely heinous Argentinian Renault campaign of interminable ads. In one, a guy named Megan is cast as Jesus. Another shows the gory details of a woman giving birth in the back of the vehicle. Paralysed driver Then there's a mystifying two-minute Japanese commercial in which the paralyzed former Formula 1 driver Clay Regazzoni extolls the virtues of driving a Honda. This left the crowd clapping along to the jingle in the dark. Me? Pining for the salt lake flats of Utah, I sloped off to hear Joe Pytka speak at lunch on the Majestic beach. Sometimes, the abroad can be a lonely place. Stefano Hatfield is managing director and editorial director of Ad Age Global © 2001, Crain Communications Inc. Editor@AdAge.com ..