Cannes Vox Pop: Steve Back, Film Juror

June 29 2009, 1:43 am | BY Lynchy | No Comments

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CB interviews Australia’s Film Lions juror: Steve Back, ECD, Saatchi & Saatchi, Sydney.

HIGHLIGHTOF JUDGING CANNES 2009?

Finishing.By the end of each day your brain is mush, but seeing some amazing work hasbeen really good. The first four days you are seeing everything and I was blownaway by how much crap people were still entering. I was stunned. We did longdays to get through categories and some of it was just shit. I was reallydepressed by the Wednesday and then we started to see the winners emerge and itwas like, ‘now you’re starting to talk’. The Grand Prix just rose to the top, which was just awesome. It wasn’tan easy job, but they picked themselves as Gold. Meeting the otherjurors – there was no politics, no block voting, just lots of conversation.Everyone had their say, it wasn’t heated, there was heaps of discussion, notheaps of aggression. Everyone said you have to be in the room for seven days,and I had been warned that it would be ahorrible experience. But all in all, it’s beenfun.

 

LOWLIGHT?

Not being able to do stuff in the evenings because you arestuck in the judging room. It’s quite tiring; it feels like a week of workwhich you are not getting paid for.

 

HAS IT INSPIRED YOU?

It’s been quite inspiring to see what you need to do to betop in the world. You get a few clues from seeing so much work in such a shortamount of time. It’s inspired me to go back and kick everyone’s arse. A lot ofthe Thai work, and its use of humour, was sensational, and if we could get someof that it would be great. Australia does some great work and we should beproud of work like Boag’s, which is a beautiful idea, but we want to get moreof that stuff.  The expectations isthat because you are Australian the sense of humour should rise, but it doesn’tdo as well as it should. I don’t think we deliver as much as we should.

 

BEST ADVICE WHILE JUDGING?

Drink lots of coffee. After lunch you find yourself in adark room kind of nodding off, so there was a serious amount of coffeeconsumed.

 

PERSONAL FAVOURITE TO WIN GRAND PRIX?

If we were going for a traditional commercial, then GTTokyo’s ‘Love Distance’ for Sagami Condoms. I agree with the Grand Prix (TribalDDB Amsterdam for Philips ‘Carousel’). It was a great decision and there was alot of conversation about it, so it was good.

 

WHAT’S NEXT FOR YOU?

I’m on holidays in Italy for a week and then back into it.