Canadian Airlines has taken flight with a pool of new spots boasting a rather generous production budget.

The $2.5-million campaign, directed by Radke Films’ Carlton Chase and created by Gee Jeffery & Partners, is part of the airline’s $38-million rebirth which follows some hard times for the carrier.

Known around the production house for months as ‘Project Boost,’ the-top secret job called for 10 days of shooting by dop Jack Green. The cameras started rolling before Christmas and continued into the new year in Guelph, Haliburton, and at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport.

The campaign hit the airwaves in mid-January with ‘He Knows,’ the launch spot featuring a man in a crowded terminal, a misplaced child’s drawing, some humming and snapping background tunes, and the unveiling of the plane’s tail sporting the new Canadian logo, a goose.

Following the launch, ‘Hockey,’ showcasing kids playing at an outdoor rink on a snowy day; ‘The Meeting,’ which pans through a busy restaurant to a woman and a bunch of men in discussion; and ‘Time Together,’ which abandons the crowds for a peaceful lake where two people paddle a canoe, will run in cycles. ‘Metal,’ a collection of plane footage cut together, will be sprinkled in.

Chase, a New York-based director on his first Canadian shoot, says he liked the overall approach to the campaign as it was mature and appreciated that it was predicated on talent, narrative and character development, ‘a refreshing change from cliche vignette advertising.’

‘I felt it advanced advertising in some fashion. Often when we are involved in such projects they involve risk-taking on the part of the agency and the client,’ he says. ‘I champion people who are able to do that kind of risk-taking because advertising in the u.s. or Canada tends to be conservative and not designed to take risks.’

Risk in the Canadian campaign, according to the director, came in the fashion in which the spots were shot, black and white as opposed to color, how the airplane was featured, and the people chosen as the paradigms of the flying public.

When shooting the spots, Chase drew on sources of inspiration such as early documentary photography and black-and-white stills from the 1950s and ’60s that would assure certain subtle distinctions and individualize each character’s story. For ‘The Meeting,’ Chase and Axyz editor Bruce Copeman applied ‘editing techniques akin to French cinema from the early ’60s and Soviet cinema from the early ’30s.’

Aside from a scheduling problem on one of the airport days, putting the crew four hours behind schedule on a 12-hour day and resulting in 34 setups in seven hours, Chase’s first outing in Canada was a positive experience that he hopes to repeat with American or European shoots.

Scott MacKenzie executive produced for Radke, Suzanne Allan was producer. Brett Channer was the creative director and writer with Chris Taciuk. Greg Trinier was associate creative director. Karen Peterman produced for the agency. Pamela Swedko