There Are No Tricks in Toyota’s ‘Outlast Outlive’ Campaign
For Toyota’s ‘Outlast Outlive’ campaign, Saatchi & Saatchi enlisted Farm League director Chris Malloy to capture real adventures featuring committed outdoorspeople, not actors, who live and breathe the outdoors. This isn’t Chris’s first time working with the agency or the brand and the trust was there for Chris to impart his creative ideas throughout the shoot. The effort was seamlessly collaborative and everyone was on board with the creative vision to centre authenticity via real locations and the people who know what to do on a wild terrain.
A few different locations were considered for the shoot - Patagonia, Iceland, Montana - all of which Chris has spent time in, though the Sierra Nevada mountain range was ultimately chosen. It’s another place that Chris is familiar with, and despite it being late spring, the region outshined all the others with the amount of snow and the variety of terrain present. There, he could capture a number of shots of the trucks in varied and beautiful conditions, mirroring scenes from the height of summer to the cool beauty of the Andes. “Everything felt alive,” Chris says of the nature during the shoot. Of course this presented challenges too or, as Chris masterfully put it, “weather is going to weather.”
Chris shot two distinct films that are invariably a part of a whole. ‘Outlive The Day’ showcases the vehicles adventuring in snow and rain during the day while ‘Nightcrawler’ shows that adventure doesn’t stop when the sun goes down. The flora and fauna of the mountains feature heavily, steeping the films in a real sense of place and creating a sense that the Sierra Nevada mountains, and nature at large, is to be respected and appreciated. Many shots don’t feature the trucks at all, instead focusing on the people out in the wild, like the runner Eli. Chris gave Eli a camera and asked him to capture footage while on one of his ultra runs.
Today, LBB caught up with Chris to find out why casting real people was essential to the fierce spirit of the films, the challenges of shooting during the night, and how his athletic experience helped to capture the action up close.
Above: 'Outlive The Day'
LBB> What was the brief from Saatchi & Saatchi like and what was your initial response?
Chris> I had been lucky enough to work with Saatchi and Toyota before, and we had a really, really great time. They had faith in us and our ideas, and they knew we wanted to show those trucks being the very best they could be – in a way that was inspiring and also relatable. Something people could actually see themselves getting to experience.
From the outset was this idea of just going headfirst into the most beautiful and rugged zones imaginable. We wanted to go to the unique places that we had been before in our personal lives. So that was the first conversation, one based on pure excitement and personal connection. We knew that with these incredible vehicles and with the way the agency team was already thinking about cast, locations, and crew, that there was a chance here to really elevate everything and make a memorable piece. From there, our team hit the ground running to find amazing people that truly walked the walk. And through our teams at Farm League, we were able to access places that really are not accessible. We were basically let off the chain to go into these great places.
LBB> How much creative freedom and input did you have when working on the two films?
Chris> From the beginning, it felt like a collaboration – we knew what we wanted to create as a team. Everybody brought energy, insight, and experience. We were united in the goal to find incredible spaces where we could set our talent and these vehicles free. Where we could push our heroes in their natural element, including getting some real dirt and blood on their hands.
LBB> Toyota’s tagline is ‘Let’s go places’. Tell us how and why you landed on the Sierra Nevada location?
Chris> We spun the globe. There was talk of deep down into Patagonia, Iceland, Montana, all these places. I’ve been lucky enough to have experienced those places, but I've also spent a lot of time in the Sierras. I knew we had a really unique opportunity with the late winter, so I wanted to seize that. We had access to so many conditions – storms, snow, arid valleys, gushing rivers – everything felt alive. In one frame it was summertime, and then literally 180 degrees you turned around and you were at a base camp in the Andes. We were shooting real snow when there should’ve been none. I feel so lucky to be from California with its many different faces, between the topography, the weather, the convergence zones of flora and fauna. So many worlds come together in California, and especially in the Sierras.
Above: 'Nightcrawler'
LBB> ‘Nightcrawler’ and ‘Outlive The Day’ have distinct personalities while the cinematography makes them feel intrinsically connected. How did you create the two different moods?
Chris> The tone, tenor, and approach of the two spots has a common thread, but the characters and the editing cadence, and certainly the music, give them their own identities. The common thread was, ‘how can we get as close to the action as possible, with the most extreme and unforgettable imagery?’ We wanted to capture the spirit of adventure and the accessibility of the outdoors as long as you have a great tool like our Toyota vehicles at the ready. I also wanted viewers to really see the human sides of these athletes, so they could see themselves in those stories too.
The soundtracks varied so greatly and brought a ton of character to both of the films. They each had an otherworldly element, especially when paired with the imagery we’d captured. It lets you leave reality a little bit and daydream about the possibilities. Almost like the opening of a big feature film, it’s just the start of an incredible journey. I wanted people to come away feeling like they wanted more. I always want the audience to come away with good questions, like where was that? Who was that? What happened there?
Director Chris Malloy on location
LBB> A lot of car ads are about comfort and convenience, but your films show the joy and revelation of off-road adventure. What is it about the path less travelled - in life and filmmaking - that appeals to you?
Chris> When you’re pushing yourself to experience new adventures, being uncomfortable and having uncertainty are intrinsically part of that. We live in an age where, through technology and through incredible gear, we’re more aware than ever of the possibilities to go to places that we wouldn't have been able to access before. When you’re driving something that you can trust, you can push yourself knowing you have the right gear to get you through it. Having worked with Toyota before, it’s been incredible to watch how their approach to getting off the beaten path has evolved into decades of tried and true R&D into these vehicles. Not only are they incredible on a city street with all the amenities that you could ever want, but they’re also built for the moments when you're three days out from the nearest paved roads and totally reliant on the vehicle to sustain you.
I really could relate to our talent on this shoot, with experiences I’ve had as a filmmaker and athlete myself. To see these people in the ice or in some crazy cave, and they've got giant smiles on their face and they're full of energy, it’s because they know the magic of the place and the circumstances, and they trust themselves and the tools they’ve chosen. They know that if you have really good gear, then you can push the limits and let your fingers go completely numb and get really hungry and take some risks, because the risks are calculated. When that’s the case, you can just let go and immerse yourself fully in the moment without fear.
LBB> We’d love to know more about the shoot itself - how big was the crew, how long did you shoot for, and in what kind of conditions?
Chris> We shot for three days in the Eastern Sierras. With terrain that was this prohibitive and unpredictable, you can’t just go in and hope for the best. The more planning we did, the more setting up we did, the more it allowed us to get out of the talent’s way on the day to just let them exist naturally in those environments. And that's where you find the magic. Despite there being a hundred people on set, we needed the talent to feel like there wasn't a camera present. That was key to the immersion. We built a crew to whom the pursuit of dynamic imagery and excelling in extreme conditions comes second nature.
Really, the way we approached the filmmaking truly embodied the message of this campaign as a whole – you plan and you do your very best to stay ahead of things, but it’s the off-script challenges that reveal the beauty of the human condition, when you say “hey, this is life and here we go.”
LBB> The films feature real people adventuring out in the wild. Tell us a little bit about them and why you decided to forgo the actor route?
Chris> We wanted to prioritise people who would be really comfortable in the natural environments that were so crucial to the success of the films. People who had spent their lives pursuing these adventures. Over the years, we’ve met a lot of different climbers, long distance runners, surfers, mountain bikers, and far beyond. I recognise the real ones when I see them. So we called mountain guides, checked in with the surf and ultra communities, tapped into the networks we’re already a part of to make sure we were sourcing the real deals for every character. And the names started coming out of the woodworks. Ultimately we built an incredible group of people with the right heart, the right spirit, the willingness to go and get cold or run the trail again. That spirit was gold.
The perfect example are those two climbers featured in the spot – they're just in the back of the truck, totally genuinely exhausted. They’d been climbing the whole day and the day before, and then we had 'em running around. So when they were just laying in the back of the Toyota, they were actually that tired. We were filming a whole other scene at the time when we noticed them lounging back there, so Jason from our art department pulled out his iPhone and grabbed that shot in the moment. I said, ‘Hey, can you get that to the team?’, and next thing you know it’s in the final broadcast piece.
The runner we cast, Eli, is also a friend of mine. He lives in Navajo Nation on a ranch where he runs cattle and he does ultra runs. I knew he'd be so perfect for this, so we flew him out to the mountains for the shoot. We filmed a few scenes with him, but more importantly, we gave him a GoPro, and told him to just go for a run, be safe, and see some things. And so he just took off up in the mountains with the GoPro on, and three or four hours later, he showed up with incredible footage that made the final cuts.
LBB> What was the most challenging part of making these films? Any problems that needed solving?
Chris> We knew from first reading the scripts that ‘Nightcrawler’ was going to be a real challenge since it required full immersion in the night environment, which is never an easy thing to capture, especially when you need to capture stunning vehicles, sheet metal, all that. So we began the lighting conversations with our DP, Danny Moder, as early in the process as we could to start planning solutions. Beyond that, the rivers up there were so alive, the snow was melting. So you can plan all you want but ultimately weather is going to weather. Plus with our remote locations, everywhere we went, we really had to haul in. It took either a four-wheel drive vehicle that could actually get to those spots, or in some cases just Sherpa vibes, camera boxes on shoulders and people hauling things in.
LBB> And what was your favourite part of making these films?
Chris> I loved the initial brainstorming sessions with Saatchi, and getting all their ideas and their hopes and dreams on what we could make. We really set out to capture amazing people in amazing places and showcase the Toyota vehicles handling the environments and elements they were built for, and we came away from the shoot with a ton of great footage. Plus, we got to film with real heroes in our spots. People who don’t live their lives to be in commercials, but that we were able to motivate to come out and have a great time on set with us. If I end the shoot with the feeling of, I would totally do that again, that was really fun instead of a ‘oh, thank God we’re done’ - I think that’s a great way to end a shoot.
