Derivative T.V. Advertising Does Not Float My Boat

So, the other day I was watching "Dog The Bounty Hunter" (or somesuch daytime nonsense) and an advert for MoneySupermarket.com came on. I tend to blank out most television adverts because they usually bore me rigid, but something in this one felt strangely familiar. I couldn't put my finger on it until I realised; it's a rip-off of the 'Construct' scene in the original Matrix film.

In this scene, the character 'Trinity' enters the basis of the Matrix computer program in order to familiarise the protagonist, 'Neo', with it. In MoneySupermarket.com's advert, the camera angles, the way that the objects in the advert rush towards the viewer, and even the costumes of the actors, are all exactly the same. It's all kinda dripping with a 1999-esque "Hey guys, we just saw the Matrix for the first time, and DAMN, is that film cool!" sentiment.

Check it out here: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2383912773090725604&q=moneysupermarket.com+advert&total=5&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=0

Clearly, the work experience boy was ill that week, and the designers didn't get their coffee. What a lazy concept for an ad! "Let's nick this idea, because the film came out ages ago, and no-one's going to notice we're too dumb to think up our own concepts!"

But wait! There's more! Fiat's new "Italian Job Remixed" is guilty of this apparent trend of film parodies/clumsy rip-offs, albeit to a lesser extent (looks like there was some coffee available here). In this advert, red, green and white Puntos nail it around somewhere foreign-looking (Italy presumably), going down escalators and all manner of crazy things that you can('t) do when you get your own Punto. The advert ends with the tagline; "The Italian Job Remixed".

http://www.tellyads.com/show_movie.php?filename=TA3771&advertiser=Fiat

This is actually quite a good advert - I like the sounds that the ignition and the doors closing contribute to the soundtrack, and snappily shot which is always a good thing. It holds your attention well, and the concept isn't as lazy as the first advert. At least they've tried to do something different.

But I still dislike it for not being 100% original. Maybe I'm just a perfectionist, but I prefer to see creativity I haven't seen before. It just seems lazy to copy someone else, unless you're going to parody it in an amusing way. If you're doing a funny parody, you're adding an element of your own creativity that is sufficiently different and removed from the original to show you're using it as just a starting point for creative exploration.