Vespa Spotting: Coca-Cola’s “I Wish” (2004)

There’s a red Vespa in the ad immidiately below. But that’s just my convenient excuse so I could blog about some of my favorite Coke ads which actually make this post mostly off-topic.

Anyway, about two years ago, Coca-Cola came up with this global ad campaign that shows a girl who ‘magically’ dispenses Coke from out of her bag. Nope, I’m not talking about the TVC that shot the then unkown Nikki Gil to celebrity-dom; but the original ad from the UK which was also shown in the US. If you haven’t seen it, watch it here.

Bet you forgot to look for the red Vespa. Well, play it again!

I know you’ve heard the Tagalog version “Sana” (which literally means “I Wish”) in the past. But doesn’t it sound like you’ve heard that English version before? That’s because it’s a song from the 60′s remade by many artists, the most recent of which is by Lighthouse Family (“Free”).

Isn’t it amazing how the whole concept is exactly like the local TVC shown here yet so different? Makes you wanna see the Manila-version again. Well, check this out!

The texture of this Manila ad is, well… very Manila! The place even looked kinda gritty with the various posters plastered on walls, signboards on street posts and cramped sidewalks with different sorts of people: the pahinates, the takatak boy, students, the religious lola, Muslim merchants, the SM-ish sales lady and if you pay more attention, even the familiar Bumbay with turban! How downtown Manila can you get than that? I think this was shot somewhere in Manila’s Chinatown or Escolta. Backing-up Nikki’s vocals is the local male group, Akafellas as based on this live performance.

What impresses me about this ad is that the entire walk-on-the-sidewalk scene (with all those people and all those hidden bottles of Coke!) is done in one flawless, continuous shot. No cuts nor splices. I wonder how many takes it took to come up with the finish ad. This local ad was directed by Thierry Notz — the same guy who made that award-winning “Lolo/Karen” McDo commercial.

There is a Spanish version of the same ad concept though I feel it didn’t try too hard to embrace the Spanish culture and instead, stayed as close to the original; from the wet road, to the man on the phone, to the garbage bag guy, to the old man holding a bouquet, and even down to the parked red scooter on the street. Anyway, I still wanna share the clip with you to see it for yourself.

But you have to give it to Coke and it’s ad agencies across the world for coming out with global campaigns such as this. Kinda reminds us of the “I’d Like to Buy the World a Coke” Hilltop ad of the ’70s and the “I am the Future of the World“ Lilet ad in the ’80s.

And here’s another global Coke ad where the guy uses the familiar Nokia ringtone (trivia: the Nokia tune — said to be one of the world’s most heard tune — is a bar from the song “Gran Vals” by Spanish musician Francisco Tárrega) as his pick-up ‘line’. The wholesome message of the ad is: offering a Coke is almost as good as saying ‘hello.’ I don’t know if Coca-Cola Phils. will ever come up with its own version since Pepsi recently made a similar ringing soda ad for a special promo. Anyway, here’s the English, Chinese, Spanish and Pakistani versions of that Coke ringtone ad.

Now I’m wondering if “Ito ang beat…” got other versions….

YouTube, here I come!

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J0HNRANA

john[dot]rana[at]gmail[dot]com