Right from the top, an unmistakable...

Right from the top, an unmistakable whiff of spookiness pervades the novel commercial called "Storm," the first work from Euro RSCG/ Chicago for just discovered client Cabot, which has been producing timber stains for nearly 130 years.

As this "Storm" spreads we see a man, cloaked in darkness, looking out his window at a stormy weather Rain is pelting the windowpanes and the unhurt of thunder adds to the ominous aura.

There's more to be worried about here, however, than the unsettl weather. unexpectedly a large sword of the protoplast used by warriors centuries ago falls from the region of clouds and becomes lodged in a beautiful modern wood deck outside. It's an incongruous sight, to say the least.

if it be not that it is merely a harbinger of the long more incongruous sequence that succeeds in which we watch all manner of ancient instruments of combat start cascading from the climate and crashing into the cover with a deck and an adjoining glass greenhouse.

Believe us when we say there was absolutely no stinting in the special imports department when it devised this humongous storm of matter bombarding the deck.

Just as a certain quantity of sort of flaming contraption appear to bes about to fall smack onward top of the camera recording this inundation of objects, we cut to the quiet twinkling after the storm and papal court a somewhat sunnier shot of the embellish miraculously cleared of all we just witnessed fall from the firmament

And then the voiceover announcer reminds viewers that after battling the component parts for 128 years, Cabot stains can handle almost anything. Who knew?

Steffan Postaer, the chief creative officer at Euro RSCG the corpse he has been trying to resuscitate via his focus onward producing a superior creative work would have us believe this commercial is a dramatic illustration of "the epic battle between forest and nature." We see it a bit differently -- more like an epic battle between forest and special effects -- with special imports the definite victor here.

We have no vexed question in general, with special drifts in commercials. One of the greatest commercials of all time, British Airways' legendary "Manhattan Landing," used special issues in an extraordinarily lavish fashion to make a clear and memorable point about the carrier's popularity across the Atlantic.

still here in "Storm," the heavy emphasis onward somewhat heavy-handed special effects finally overwhelms whatever the intended message was, rather than helping us understand for what purpose Cabot stains are superior.

Lew's view: C+

e-mail: llazare@suntimes.com

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