Pixar's UP - Spotted Metaphors

In this animated comedy film, retired balloon salesman Carl Friedricksen decides to escape being forcibly sent to a retirement home after an altercation with a construction worker.  He ties a vast number of helium-filled balloons to his house, and flies away to South America - fulfilling a long-held ambition to rediscover the lost world of Paradise Falls.  But he hasn't reckoned on coping with a stowaway - an eight year old boy called Russell.

In their book "Metaphors We Live By",  George Lakoff and Mark Johnson discuss the "Up" metaphor.  They say the central metaphor is the "Journey" metaphor - the journey is a metaphor for life.

Specific metaphors in the film include:

A rainbow of balloons against a a blue sky.  This represents the quest for a life less ordinary - a life of adventure (written on the balloon held by eight year old Russell).

This is mirrored by the exotic rainbow bird, representing exotic (lost) lands and rare adventure - fantastic possibilities that no one believes are true.

The story book that regularly appears during the course of the movie represents the chapters and pages of life.  Carl Friedricksen discovers that he appreciates each chapter with the benefit of hindsight - and that he hadn't celebrated what had been achieved at the time.

The initial adventure is to reach Paradise Falls (a reference to Paradise Lost - a lost world complete with dinosaurs and other exotic creatures).  However, the lesson or moral (so often a part of children's stories) is that the goals you start off with in life are not always the goals that are the most rewarding, nor are they achieved necessarily in the way you think they will be achieved.

A life of adventure - a life less ordinary is what Friedricksen is seeking.  However, he finally realises that this goal has already been achieved - this chapter in the book has been written, once he takes the time to turn over the pages.  The house eventually reaches the falls after its journey - but that specific goal is no longer the point in life.  He has moved on.

What gives life its meaning is not the destination - it's the journey.  In the film's final scenes the house is at the falls - but he has a new life with the little boy.

Somatics and emotions

Research has found just by making a face smiling – the emotion is the physical.

This is essentially what somatics is about the human body as a means of expressing emotions and feelings. By studying somatics (including body language but well beyond the Peace type of micro-expressions) we can understand more about the emotional state. Somatic metaphors provide the means of exploring how the emotions are experienced by the persons by tapping into their metaphors.

…. as a way of reading emotions and that indeed they are the emotions www.marketingsomatics.com shows original research conducted by INSIDE STORY that highlights how identity is expressed somatically. Four distinct metaphor clusters show how

This is essentially what somatics is about the human body as a means of expressing emotions and feelings. By studying somatics (including body language but well beyond the Peace type of micro-expressions) we can understand more about the emotional state. Somatic metaphors provide the means of exploring how the emotions are experienced by the persons by tapping into their metaphors.

…. as a way of reading emotions and that indeed they are the emotions www.marketingsomatics.com shows original research conducted by INSIDE STORY that highlights how identity is expressed somatically. Four distinct metaphor clusters show how

Emotional marketing - at point of sale

Metaphors are being used in a range of marketing applications including Point of Sale. See this innovative point of sale metaphor for Chupa Chups creating a garden of earthy delights in a supermarket. Sweets have been long thought to grow on trees and therefore this simple metaphor has deep significance.
There are also some fabulous ferris wheels and other variations such as flower pots that show how a range of emotional elements can be brought into a vital marketing area that currently lacks emotional relevant.
Also see Marketing Somatics and INSIDE STORY Knowledgement Management.

What are somatic metaphors?

Metaphors pose a means of getting deeper as they enable access to feelings and thoughts that can’t be readily expressed in words. Latest thinking about emotions points to the potential importance of somatic metaphors because emotions are embodied – that is, experienced in the body. By accurately reflecting the bodily experience marketers create more powerful communications. Metaphors are perfect for this.

Some examples of somatic metaphors are: ‘step forward’, ‘over the top’, ‘hidden’, ‘surface’, ‘deep’, ‘down to earth’, ‘expanding’, ‘out there’, ‘warm hearted’, ‘blood boiling’, ‘weighted down’, and ‘backed up against the wall’. These metaphors all relate to bodily experience. They can contain clues that help researchers understand people’s emotions as well as predispositions to like and dislike ads, packs and brands.

Somatic metaphors are used in marketing somatics a new emerging area of marketing practice that leverages the knowledge with the consumer's own brain maps.

We need to widen our ‘vocabulary’ to encompass experiences that cannot be readily expressed in language. This is where metaphors became very useful and where somatic metaphors are working particularly well as a means of gaining insight.

Down metaphor now cool

Down is an orientation metaphor that reflects one of the basic experiences of spatial orientation. As we have discussed there is a cultural bias towards UP and the closely associated forward - representing GOOD in our society - and a bias against DOWN and backwards arising from the fundamental human experience that we are all upright in position, see and move frontward. For more about this see Cooper and Ross World Order 1975 and the 'me-first orientation'.

Despite this - in Sydney and Singapore it’s becoming more cool to be depressed. Depression is sweeping teens and now is aspirational – for some at least.

Associated with a subculture called Emos - Emos fit perfectly into INSIDE STORY’s ‘Still Waters’ segment a segment not as much targeted by marketers but showing increasing interest more recently. We are now seeing a lot of fashion spreads in magazines like Frankie and Russh..see the May Russh fashion spread – ‘back in the USSR…go underground this summer’. Rip Curl experimented with the depressed and even played very subtly with the death wish for a while in their shop window in Sydney - though this seems to have disappeared.

The dark mood is reflected in a lot of the top designer ads for Prada and others who use the greyed out tones for their fashion shoots only highlighting the product in colour. Seemingly a smart way to maximise product impact but also a subtext which is a bulls eye to the emerging emo target. Poses are almost always reclining – metaphorically symbolic of DOWN, PASSIVE, BACK. Many of the top designers featured reclining models in their depressed states in windows in Orchard Road in April.

Up metaphor in marketing

McDonalds has just launched it's Light Choices TV ad which is a classic UP metaphor. I have written about the fundamental significance of UP as a metaphor before and I won't repeat except to say it is very fundamental to our biological programming - and if we are looking to connect at a deep emotional level - we need to use the up metaphor and other somatic metaphors.

Consider what the ad would be like if it told us that McDonalds had a lot of lighter healthy choices - perhaps like McDonalds has been doing for some time. We know that information - that's information and that's good but... it doesn't connect in like this ad can.

The ads goes up and up into other higher, lighter more airy worlds featuring McDonalds Lighter almost fantasy/other world offerings without even mentioning 'healthier for you'. It is the overiding sensation that makes the difference - no need (and better not) to say much at all. We all intrinsically know what the UP metaphor is about - it intrinsically feels good - it intrinsically is good - defying all verbal description. Good one McDonalds!

Wolf Blass's eagle is also another excellent example of the UP metaphor in marketing. They don't have to use words to say what they are trying to say about the brand and trying to describe their positioning still defies words. The soaring eagle says it all to many wine drinkers. True people can't put the brands positioning into words - but who cares?

Renault Megane recently tried to own UP and register it as a trademark. I noticed the outdoor campaign but don't think many other people did except those people watching for metaphors. I applauded the registration of UP. However, it was really only a series of views looking up into the sky from an open car so it didn't really capture very much of the potential impact of the UP metaphor. It is also interesting to see that they are really clued into the metaphoric symbolism of the car - and also making deliberate allusions to "the butt" of their car in their advertising. Interested to see what they do next.

Red star rising again

The iconography of Soviet communism is achieving cool status. Once associated with workers, heavy unattractive industry (and definitely not an attractive art form), the iconography is becoming increasingly seen in magazines, coffee places and things aimed at Youth. The particular favourites are definitely the more benign red star, Mao and the distinctive style of communist writing.

In Shanghai, Kommune is a one such coffee place using all the now cool iconography of the Soviet era and in youth targeted magazines such as Yen.

Little red stars are cropping up in all sorts of places.

Now metaphorically – what is the relevance and appeal of the soviet red star?

The origin of the pentagram is the human body – the head, two arms and two legs spread wide like Leonardo’s Vitruvian man. This interests me because of my interest in somatic metaphors and how bodily experiences relate to the human experience and emotions.

The Soviet red star however is said to represent the five fingers of the workers hand among other things to do with the number 5. (Apparently the origins of the star come from the red army who painted the tin stars worn by Moscow garrison solders red to distinguished them from other soldiers in retreat from WW1).