‘The Times’ writes about Director Hugh Hudson and ‘Gertcha’, legendary monochrome Courage Best Bitter television commercial photographed by Robert Krasker, BSC in 1979

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The Times, 28 March 1982, issue 61189, page 15, ‘The big screen craftsmen with a 30-second start. Marketing and advertising: Behind the Camera”, by Torin Douglas. Gale Document Number: GALE|CS252545655. Access and image courtesy of State Library of New South Wales.

I was fortunate enough to have lived and worked in London during the 1990s and was exposed to some of the best television, print and poster advertising ever created.

For too short a time I was even more fortunate to have worked on the other side of the screen, the page and poster at The Leagas Delaney Partnership, now Leagas Delaney, alongside some of the greatest copywriters and art directors in the world including “God of Copywriting” Tim Delaney, commissioning some of the greatest photographers to work on advertising campaigns for global brands; and then I had to come back to Australia.

During that time and the period back in Sydney when I worked in one of the better creative advertising agencies here, I was inspired by many inspiring TVCs shot in black and white, or monochrome “as the Europeans so pretentiously put it”, and that were made over several decades including the late 1990s.

In my humble opinion Director Hugh Hudson’s Gertcha shot by the great Director of Photography Robert Krasker stands in the same ballpark as Director Jonathan Glazer’s Surfer.

The “Gercha” commercial exemplifies Hudson’s approach to film-making, according to Mr Webster. “He has class and he’s very intelligent. He surrounds himself with the right people for the job.

“For the ‘Gercha’ commercial, which was to be shot in black and white, he decided to use Bob Krasker, who worked on The Third Man, as his lighting cameramen. He had to pull him out of retirement – he was more than 70-years old but Hugh knew he was the man for the job.

“Now in those days, lighting was far more difficult and the lighting cameramen were real Tartars – they expected to be obeyed. I was on the set and under the lights it frankly looked awful, but Hugh said it would be all right. When I saw the rushes they were marvellous – the lighting helped create the whole look of the commercial.”

Such attention to detail can turn an ordinary commercial into something special, that viewers – and customers – can take pleasure in. Underlying the quality approach of the best British commercials is the belief that the advertisements, unlike television programmes, are broadcast uninvited into the home, and that entertaining the viewer is at least as effective a way of influencing the public as beating peeople over the head with the brand name and the heavy sales pitch.

It is a belief that costs the advertiser considerable sums.

Still-frame from Gertcha television commercial for Courage Best Bitter, photographed by Robert Krasker, BSC, directed by Hugh Hudson, released in 1979.

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