This Gummy Is A Good Gummy

What did I learn from 'Lost in Translation'? Many, many things. How to open a movie, what I'm missing by not watching Japanese talk shows, that karaoke gets a bum rap in the States, just for a few examples. I also thought I learned that when American actors went to Japan to whore themselves out by doing commercials, that it is a soul crushing experience. But apparently I was wrong, and apparently I shouldn't use the word whore so willy nilly (for some reason people tend to get offended by it). I learned this a few months ago in a conversation with my friend's uncle, who works on these types of commercials, where he told me that the movie had missed the point of the ads. I told him he had missed the point of the movie, the point of course being Scarlett and her lovely doe eyes. Luckily he chose to ignore me, and continued to argue that those commercials were all about matching the essence of an actor with a product. He went on to tell a story about a Western actor selling air conditioners. Or radios. There was a car involved. And I think the ad was in the desert. Which makes me think it was the air conditioner. Anyway, the guy stared ( or was it glared...) and people loved it. The product whatever it was, was extremely successful.

Despite that pitiful retelling (forgive me, it's 3 in the morning) the story (or, the point he was making with it) stuck with me, especially in the last few months, as American celebrities have begun warming up and starting to sell products in America. Though, except for the trailblazing courage of the Catherine Zeta-Jones-es of the world, most of them are hiding behind their voices. Celebrities like Jeff Bridges, Sean Connery, and Gene Hackman have all lent their voices to different ads. The weirdest one by far though, has to be Kiefer Sutherland. It might just be my mind, but it seems like Sutherland's voice is being used to pitch everything, I know for sure that's him talking about the Intel chips being used in Macs. But didn't these people see 'Phone Booth'? Actually, I guess a lot of people didn't see 'Phone Booth', but if they had, then they would know that Kiefer Sutherland has the scariest voice in the world. Or if they had seen 'The Lost Boys'. Or 'Stand By Me'. ' Or one episode of '24'. Or if they had ever listened to... his voice. Instead they use his voice to achieve the regular, trust us about how great our product is effect.

The Japanese on the other hand? They get it. They use the Jack Bauer character as a kind of modern day Malboro Man gimmick. Do I want to be like Jack Bauer? Hell yeah I do. Then eat Calorie Mates. Hell yeah I will. Wait what are Calorie Mates? Does it matter? No. No it does not. Bill Murray would be perfect to sell Santory Whiskey with those dark mascara eyes of his, it probably would have been a fantastic ad if the director hadn't been such a jerk. Hollywood has never been an industry built on integrity, and as much as we like to fight against the idea and complain about it, we're just kidding ourselves. So if we're going to whore ourselves out, we might as well whore ourselves correctly. And there, I did it again. It just sounds so good... whore. It rolls off the tongue. And, that sounded dirtier than I meant it to. Sorry.