CRITICS of TV political ads never fail to find something wrong with some of these commercials:
--Gibo Teodoro's, featuring him about to fly a plane, is "elitist" as most people can't even afford to buy a plane ticket;
--Noynoy Aquino's, showing him being passed a torch in a scene filled with celebrities, dazzles audience but obscures message;
--Richard Gordon's, with him as Red Cross leader helping calamity victims ("Christmas doesn't sleep" with the guy moving about), prompts the question: Wouldn't a yuletide song ("Silent Night") sound weird this time of the year?
And so forth and so on: from plain broadcast consumers to p.r. experts, from focus-group analyses to published reviews.
They find something wrong but the best test of a TV commercial, ‘tis said, is success or failure.
Manny Villar's "Dagat ng Basura (Sea of Garbage)" has fascinated the market, especially the young. Singing kids ask if one had ever taken a bath in a sea of garbage or spent Christmas in the middle of the street. Villar had, the children chorus.
Who'll end poverty?
The ad sings of Villar being "tunay na mahirap." Really, that must've been a hundred years before he became so rich he could dump a billion pesos on TV ads.
What strains belief more is the boast "siya ang magtapos ng kahirapan." No president can wipe out poverty. Not Villar, not Noynoy, not Gibo, not Villanueva (despite Eddie's assumed access to the heavens).
And definitely not Erap Estrada, convicted but pardoned plunderer. His ad claim that his shortened presidency wasn't tainted with corruption is totally staggering.
(paseares@yahoo.com)