Chevy's Glorious Holiday Spot Shows, And Doesn't Tell, A Beautiful Story
I don’t often cry during a TV spot. But I did during Chevy’s new “Holiday Ride” TV spot and longer-form short film. The story is wonderful and timely for the holidays, but the spot “does holiday” exceptionally well by showing and not telling, and by making the Chevy product the hero. First, check out the short film, it’s only 4:00 long.
Show, don’t tell. Let me count the ways.
Here’s the copy beneath the YouTube spot with the credits for this film. Good context for what I’m about to share.
Based on actual events, we teamed up with Academy Award winners Tom Hooper (director), Claudio Miranda (director of photography) and Rachel Portman (composer) to tell the story of love, redemption and restoration. Because the greatest gift anyone can ever give is joy. Happy Holidays.
It’s not hard to tell that master storytellers told this story. The arc of the story is nice: dad misses his deceased wife, daughter fixes up his wife’s old car, daughter gives the car to her dad for Christmas, emotional moment had by all, drive off. But the way the story is told is what makes this piece magical.
The director barely uses dialogue. Nearly the entire story is shown to us, not told to us. And there are many examples:
We know it’s Christmas when the dad replaces the old wreath with the new one.
We know the car is special in the way the dad is regarding it, caressing it, as if to capture a memory.
The dad shows us just how meaningful this car is to him with the closeup on his face as he’s about to get in.
The dust everywhere tells us that, to the dad, this car is a time machine. But we don’t know to what time yet.
That is, until he stumbles upon the image of a woman and the subsequent cut-aways of this woman receiving the car, then new, as a Christmas gift from the dad. It’s his wife and she has now clearly passed. A lot is communicated in this short vignette. Nothing is said.
The daughter then sees from afar her dad as he slowly closes the doors to the barn and pauses, staring at the wreath for a beat. The daughter stops and observes her dad at first with sadness, which indicates he might give this car a visit from time to time. But then she looks to the side with a soft smile, which tells us she has an idea.
And THEN at exactly 1:37 into the film, listen the music. I swear to God it’s lifted from “Somewhere Over The Rainbow,” telegraphing oh-so-subtly to the viewer that hope is on the way.
NOTE: there has been no dialogue yet, but the story is so tightly and wonderfully told. The first dialogue exposes the daughter’s idea to some local mechanics. And then it’s back to showing, not telling.
We know refurbishing the car is a surprise when we see the daughter rattling pots and pans to cover for the sound the mechanics are making getting the car out of the barn. The dad even reacts to the noise she’s making, but says nothing.
And my favorite “show, don’t tell” example is when the dog runs outside and instinctively knows not to bark at the strangers. This one decision adds so much to the magic.
We see a montage of the men and daughter working tirelessly on the car.
And then we see the resolution. The dad goes back out to the barn to replace the wreath again, opens the door and, like his wife, is surprised and overjoyed at seeing the perfectly painted, shiny car in the bay.
Dammit, I’m crying again.
Then the dad proudly drives the car out of the barn to greet and thank his daughter, but even this dialogue reveals more than just the words that are said. The daughter says, “It’s what mom would have wanted.” What did the daughter mean by that? That mom wants the dad to move on. That the mom was, through her daughter, effectively giving the car back to the dad as a symbolic gesture that it’s okay to move on now.
When they say it’s best to “show, don’t tell,” this film is a master class all by itself. But there’s another reason I love this spot.
The Chevy product is the hero.
Too many brands pump out emotional ads during the holidays designed to touch our hearts but say absolutely nothing about their brand, their product, or anything else. They are gratuitous borrowers of holiday interest and nothing more.
But this spot is centered around an old beautiful Chevy. Not only that, the spot shows us the emotion that a car can capture, hold, and allow people to re-experience. In this case, the old Chevy was both a time machine looking back and the ticket for moving forward.
Without trying, this spot communicates Chevy’s long heritage in Americana and the loyalty of its buyers. All while actually touching our heart strings during the holiday season. For all of those reasons, “Holiday Ride” is now officially one of my favorite spots ever.
At least within this amazing film, Chevy is joy.
Will Burns is the Founder & CEO of Ideasicle X and a Brand Consultant. Follow him on Twitter @WillOBurns
