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Who Can You Depend On? Thoughts About the Movie Cedar Rapids

The other night on Pay Per View, I enjoyed Cedar Rapids, a truly funny flick about small-time Insurance Agents who gather at a convention.

And what doubled my pleasure was that, in between the laughs, I couldn't help but read the movie as reflective of our culture's current qualms about the dependability of its own economic institutions, and the businesses that promote them.

After all, how many times have you seen an insurance company touted as "rock solid"?  And don't brand images like this entail promises of impeccable integrity and care?  Yet, who looked shakier during the recent crash than AIG?

The Education of a Small-Town Guy

Such issues are played out hilariously through the hero of this tale: a small-town guy named Tim Lippe.  Lippe is ordered by his boss to attend a convention in Cedar Rapids, IA (a big city, for him).

His assignment is to redeem the credibility of his insurance company from scandal.  One of its main agents died in unseemly circumstances (via auto-asphyxiation) and there are rumors that the company's "Double Diamond Award" (for integrity) will be rescinded.  Lippe's job is to come home with the award once again.

Lippe is a true believer in the insurance business.  We find out that agents helped his mother get back on her feet after his father's death.  He's also seen his local company help flood victims and others in need

At the same time, he's shown to be incredibly naive, especially socially, and this is played to comic extremes when he meets up with worldly party animals: agents from other towns such as John C. Reilly and Anne Heche.

At might be expected, during the course of the film Reilly and Heche show him how to loosen up.  He even has a one night stand with Heche, who's married with kids but has no guilt about getting a little on the side at conventions like these.

Part of his education, though, also entails learning the dirty secrets of the Insurance Business.  Reilly reveals to him that the "Double Diamond Award" was achieved through a pay-off of the local President of ASMI (the industry organization throwing the convention).

To make matters worse, this same President (outwardly a holy-roller who starts each conference meeting with a group prayer) wants to deny Lippe the award this year on what amounts to a morals charge: he's seen Lippe partying with his new friends.  Lippe then compromises himself by paying him off (for the good of the company's name).

But, of course, in a feel-good comedy, cynicism is never rewarded.  Lippe's boss shows up and, with the help of his regained credibility, makes a deal to sell the company.  Lippe only gets to keep his job if he relocates to Milwaukee.

At this point, he revolts.  He gets in touch with his own clients who agree to stay with him, exposes his boss and the President, and forms his own company (joining forces with the other agents with whom he's been partying).

Who Are the Good Guys?

The movie takes a sort of romantic (and conventional) stance as to who you can really trust.  Those who "let it all hang out", are the most honest characters.  They're transparent (wearing their hearts on their sleeves).  And transparency, perhaps because of  the malfeasance that led to the crash, is an increasingly popular word in business culture today.

The portrayal of the villains is also familiar: the most outwardly straight-laced (and powerful) are the culprits.

Ethics or Politics?

Though a fable, this film offers an insight into a problem plaguing our economy.  The scholar David Harvey has remarked that what threaten "the system" nowadays are not the needs of those on the lower rungs -- but the privileges demanded by the high and mighty.

And, the movie also agrees with Harvey that, if the credibility of the economy is to be preserved, it will be achieved by the efforts of its foot soldiers.

But here the film parts ways with him.  Cedar Rapids suggests that if industries like insurance really did stick to the small-business (and small-town) values they preached -- if they took Lippe's ethics seriously -- a lot of problems would be eliminated.

Harvey sees the answer not in ethics alone, but also politics.  As he puts it: "Paradoxically, a strong and powerful social democratic and working-class movement is in a better position to redeem capitalism than is capitalist class power itself."

In any case, it's interesting that what's caused social upheavals in recent times is the same as what leads to trouble in the movie.  From Cedar Rapids to Cairo, what pisses people off is the idea that those they've been asked to trust are pocketing all the money and the benefits for themselves. Thoughts?



 

"Imported from Detroit" and Made in America: Dr. Dre and John Varvatos in Chrysler Commercials

Chrysler's "Imported from Detroit" campaign (the brainchild of French-born marketing guru Olivier Francois) covered on this blog a few months back, tuned out to be a hit.  brandchannel recently reported on its success:

"Chrysler was clearly onto something when it launched its breakthrough 'Imported from Detroit' campaign.  Sales spiked, leading the company to launch phase 2.  Explaining the positioning, Chrysler CMO Olivier Francois told brandchannel 'American coolness is essential to our strategy, because that's exactly what imports do not have, and some other American [luxury] brands don't have as well."

Here are two of the latest spots from the campaign that build on its position.  One featues Detroit-born high-fashion designer John Varvatos, the the other Dr. Dre:

 

 

The Chrysler 300 in these ads is considered a luxury car.  And one of the reasons the spots work, it seems to me (and perhaps one the secrets of the "American" positioning),  is that they're able to make luxury seem cool, rather than just boujie.  But how do they do that?

For one thing, they suggest that in America there's little shame in luxury.  Because this sort of luxe is accessible across class and race lines, if you work hard enough.

And the bold, blue-collar celebrity endorsers in these spots (like Eminem in the kickoff spot) have a nice rub-off on the car itself. Their presence and authenticity assure not only fine workmanship, but originality and most of all hipness.

A Bit Utopian...But So What?

You could say then, that these commercials work on reinventing the American Dream, not to mention the industrial might that made it credible.  Whether such a meaning rhymes with the current state of the economy may not really matter.  Ads are about wishes (often utopian) as much as they are about products.

But not only that.  Due to the increasing class stratification in the U.S., where "the top 1% alone control nearly 40% of the wealth,"  it turns out that the top 10% of households now "account for almost half of consumer spending."  In other words, the message of these spots simply doesn't have to be believable to everyone to make them effective.

And recent data reveals that "American Made" is an appealing pitch to the affluent.  brandchannel points outs that "traditionally, it has been the lower end brands that have leveraged the appeal of American-made, but now luxury brands have picked up the theme...

"An American Express Publishing/Harrison Group survey conducted this year showed that more than 75% of wealthy consumers like brands made in America, and 65% of them buy American-made products whenever possible."

The piece I'm quoting from speculates that the appeal of such branding could be the result of anything from ideas that buying American is good for business, patriotic -- or that such products are simply made better.  It also mentions a website (MadeInUSAForever), whose following is growing quickly, dedicated to this sort of "nationalist" shopping,  that offers more reasons why people should consume this way.

 Certainly, the idea that your consumption habits have political consequences has been richly elaborated throughout U.S. history.  The very identity of "the consumer", in fact, was invented in part by the New Deal administration as a counterweight against corporate power.

For that matter, the success of the Chrysler campaign itself will have an effect on current politics. Because the the U.S. car industry's rebirth was jumpstarted by government investment, it will be a key theme for the Dems in the upcoming presidential race.  The Obama campaign is even replacing McCain's "Joe the Plummer" with "James the Jeep Worker."

As far as the Chrysler campaign goes, though, I think the appeal is best explained by a bit of literary, rather than political, history.  It turns out that nationalism is tied to distinct meanings in terms of aesthetics, too.

The great literary historian, Pascale Casanova, tells us that in the evolution of world literature, France, via of course Paris, once assumed total dominance.  So much so, that the styles of Parisian art and writing were considered a universal measure of the best there was.  French aesthetics were judged the most sophisticated and "cosmopolitan" (or, as we'd put it today, they were the signature style of "globalism"). 

But, as German national consciousness rose, to compete with the French, another measure of good literature came about.  According to the German philosopher Herder, the arts, rather than copy the global standard (or aim for universality), should strive for authenticity.  And this would be achieved, he theorized, if they sought to express the "soul" of the Nation and its people.

Chrysler's CMO is following Herder's strategy for his brand communications.  What's more associated with the "American soul" than cool?

But, ironically, it's taken a sophisticated, French-born, cosmopolitan executive to grasp this. Thoughts?