Alfa in TV commercial

[CARIBOULH@xxxxxxx]

I finally saw the soft drink commercial (was it for Pepsi or Coke? I didn't
pay attention once I saw the Alfa) where the girl removes a rock from behind
the tire and the Spider (or was it a Duetto) rolls off a cliff. WAIT A MINUTE
HERE....

We never actually see the car crashing! It simply rolls over the cliff and out
of sight. Having a passing familiarity with how "Hollywood" operates (my wife
has been in charge of providing production companies with Land Rovers and I've
dabbled with writing a couple of screenplays) I believe that the car simply
rolled over the cliff, down onto a ramp and out of sight. In fact the canyon
background may even have been inserted thru a blue screen process and the
scene actually shot somewhere quite different.

If it was actually shot at a canyon, having a ramp to retrieve the car makes
sense for two major reasons:
1) The environmental permits necessary to allow a car to free fall and crash
below considering the negative impact on the area and the cleanup costs
afterward would be significant. Much cheaper to build a platform to catch the
car.

2) If the shot was NOT done in one take and you needed to reshoot, you've
destroyed one of the central characters. Okay you say, simply roll another one
off the cliff, well then you go back to point one above except now you're
going to roll how many cars off that cliff?

Or if it was shot under controlled circumstances it would have been easy to
shoot against a blue screen and then insert in a static scenery shot. In this
case the car certainly rolled down a ramp behind the "cliff" with the cliff
only being high enough to conceal the car disappearing behind it.

So, I think the bottom line here is that particular Alfa still exists (maybe a
little worse for wear... production crews are well known for being
horrendously rough on the vehicles they use) and everyone out there can still
drink their favorite brand of soda without regrets.

P.S. Has anyone come up with that Fiat Press web site address for me yet?

Best Wishes,

Ed Caribou Imports, Inc.
NOW... the largest Fiat parts supplier in the Western U.S.
visit us on the Web at:
www.caribou.cc
NEW ADDITION to our Web site: check the Autotraders nationwide database of
Alfas or other vehicles for sale OR list your own car for sale FREE. Courtesy
of Caribou Imports!

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