Kopf an Kopf

Hilarious, bitter satire of adverising, humanity, and personality. Ad exec Dennis Bagley gets so hung up on boils developing a "boilbusters" ad campaign that he grows a malignant boil which takes on its own personality and eventually takes over the show. Grant is perfect in the lead role, the direction and photography are excellent, and the effects cheap but grotesque. There are so many hilarious scenes, I found myself laughing out loud through most of the film even though I saw it by myself! I love the scene where Bagley explains to his wife why the boil only talks to her when she turns away : "He's waiting for you to do it!" A classic, should be sought out by all fans of sadistic humour(especially British, i.e. League of Gentlemen, Monty Python) .

Denis Dimbleby Bagley (Richard E. Grant) is an amoral British ad executive. He's willing to sell anything to anyone. His next product pimple cream makes him obsessed with boils. His wife Julia Bagley (Rachel Ward) is concerned. He starts breaking down and growing a boil on his left shoulder. He's in the hospital to have it removed when it starts growing into a new head. His real head is lanced and the boil takes over his life as the new head.

Bruce Robinson's previous directing/writing effort 'Withnail and I' is a British indie darling. Richard E. Grant returns with brilliant effect. It is a dark rant on the ills of consumerism and a little obvious. It would be great to have more plot rather than a diatribe. This would have been a great Twilight Zone episode. A story is needed around the zit cream. Otherwise, it's a good surreal effective satire.

How to Get Ahead in Advertising

The best way to get ahead in advertising is to know the devil.

Unfortunately, since the frazzled ad man in this comedy isn't acquitted with Lucifer, he will have to get a head literally.

With a growing concern over the ethical nature of his profession, ad executive Bagley (Richard E. Grant) becomes mentally unhinged.

While struggling to come up with a slogan for a zit cream, his mania is compounded by the appearance of a pustule on his shoulder that has begun to speak to him.

In addition to the power of verbalization, over time, the abnormal abscess develops a mouth, eyes and a face, which is strikingly similar to his own, save for the moustache.

A stimulating and surreal British satire, How To Get Ahead in Advertising is a paradigm of the psychological mindset needed to survive in marketing.

Furthermore, having two heads means there's always someone to make-out with. (Green Light)

This brilliant attack on commodification and the misuse of language to cajole consumerism is a must see. I don't like to give anything away so suffice to say that Grant is excellent as the near-schizophrenic hero (anti-hero) who's copy writer's block leads to his confronting the hegemony he operates within. The film mocks the abuse of semiotics in the media; one particularly hilarious scene has Grant battling his fellow-commuters over a newspaper story designed, per Grant's character, Bagley, to lead readers to directed conclusions. In the exchange about a heroin arrest reported in the paper, police allege that a bag containing heroin "may" have also contained marijuana. Bagley burst out with, "It may have contained a f***ing pork pie!" Hilarity ensues, but not devoid of a moral lesson...you may find the rendering of William Blake's "Jerusalem" at the film's conclusion particularly ironically amusing.

If you want nuance, you'll not find it here, subtlety, pah!!! No, it's laid on with a shovel as advertising executive Richard E Grant discovers advertising is more shallow than a paddling pool, and like said pool, if a toddler was unable to contain a lavatorial need, full of....well,you know what! The trouble is, although we see Grant having his breakdown, becoming obsessive and growing a boil which becomes his alter-ego, we do not see his journey, he's dubbed a success by everyone, but we do not see him succeed. We merely witness the repercussions of his desultory realisation that he's been part of the problem, rather than the solution.

The idea of the talking boil is fun, but the scriptwriter/director didn't know whether to make it surreal, knockabout or farce, in the end sticking to what he perceives as satire. I'd have liked the themes to have been developed more - together with the two differing characters within the same body. We each see thousands of commercials on television, commercialisation is everywhere, referees and umpires have ads on their sleeves, I'm expecting the police to have sponsors' names on their trousers when they finally come to get me.

This needed a little more subtlety, more comedy with the beautiful wife, who seemed discomforted by having sex with the brash alter-ego - that could have produced an amusing scene or three.

It's much better that Robert Altman's unsuccessful parody of fashion, Pret-a-Porter, but uses a sledgehammer to lance a boil.