James Franco Directs 7 For All Mankind Film Campaign
James Franco is beefing up his jack-of-all-trades resume with a fashionable new gig: director of 7 for All Mankind's Spring 2012 ad campaign.
Last seen modeling for Gucci, the famously multitasking actor stepped behind the camera for The Death of Natalie Wood, a series of 10 film vignettes that will start launching on YouTube beginning February 15, which is the basis for the new campaign, Women's Wear Daily reports.
Centered around a group of friends gathering for a birthday party, the film stars a stylish cast headed up by model Lily Donaldson, plus actor Henry Hopper (son of Dennis), actress Nathalie Love (the daughter of Teen Vogue West Coast editor Lisa Love), and pink-haired catwalker Charlotte Free.
“The videos have a vintage feel to them," Franco, who makes a cameo in the film, tells WWD. "They feel like they are from a different era, which I think really fits with the new line that Seven had in the shoot—a lot of cool denim tops and jeans."
“The look of the film and the clothes feels very '70s,” he adds, revealing that he may direct Seven's Fall 2012 campaign as well as something for Gucci.
“We shot right on the beach and drove up the PCH [Pacific Coast Highway], so I guess you could say it’s a vintage 1970s California dreamy feel. The movies that I cut together have a lot of weird double exposures and super-imposed images over other images, so it’s a real, I guess you could say, trip.”
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Styled by Alex White, the film is surprisingly free of heavy branding, save for a shot of a redesigned logo.
"They came to me because they wanted to get away from that,” Franco says of the lack of commerciality. “We always knew that there would be print ads and videos but we could go about getting those things in a way that was very unconventional and shoot it like an art film.”
Images from the shoot were spliced together to create the label's print campaign, which will launch in the March issues.
Meanwhile, Franco is planning to show the film's extended version, which runs more than three hours, at his "Rebel" installation at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles in May.
When does this guy sleep?
