Past, Present, Future...

Submitted byJeeraik009 onThu, 08/23/2012 - 14:50

It makes sense that Red Stripe beer's new anniversary advertisement with the tagline Cheers to the next 50 will have special appeal to its young hip drinkers. Why not? most were born after 1962 and do not hold the same sense of nostalgia for Jamaica's independence. Instead, this futuristic commercial looks forward, and celebrates achievements to come. In contrast to the scattering of 50th anniversary traditional oil on canvas exhibitions such as Art Jam 50 at Gallery Barrington, Alexander Cooper's Fifty Years Then and Now at Mutual Gallery or DecorVIII's Fifty Years of Female Art, this ad is just as creative but all its visual components are visionary. Its command of new media allows for a slick makeover for Half Way Tree complete with high speed trains and digital news boards, a prediction for Jamaica's hundred metre win in 7.63 seconds and a graphic update of the National Stadium. Perhaps most compelling is its dance hall scene set in Iceland where youths in futuristic, vibrant goth-like garb, party hard. In contrast to the maudlin and ofetn sentimental imagery viewed elsewhere during this season of celebration, it's no doubt that these youths would “rather have red stripe.” The beer's Cheers to the next 50 is a bold, optimistic and visionary statement. Watch the ad.