I experienced a strong sense of déjà vu when I first saw Pacific Life's underwater tennis spot on the air last month. Almost two years ago, I'd written about a similar commercial set in a submerged tennis court for Pocari Sweat, a Japanese sports drink (Boards, June 2001). My initial reaction when I saw the Pacific spot was that it must be the result of some sort of North American licensing agreement with Pocari's production company (the original spot ran only in Japan, Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong).

But it wasn't. The Pacific Life footage is, in fact, entirely new, directed by Justin Klarenbeck of Boxer Films for agency Kovel/Fuller - both are based in LA - with effects supervised by Venice-based Digital Domain's Leslie Ekker.

Agency producer Eric Harnett says his firm was unaware of the Pocari spot when putting the creative together. He points out, too, that it was a logical follow-on from previous Pacific Life spots, which had used underwater action to connect with Pacific's whale-motif logo. What's more, he adds, Kovel/Fuller created the tennis spot to promote the client's role as name sponsor of an upcoming tennis tournament.

Unlike the Pocari version, which takes place entirely underwater, the Pacific spot opens with two world-class tennis players, Tommy Haas and Mark Philippousis, playing on court at the venue, composited with background plates from file footage of last year's tournament. Haas dives for a ball, disappears with a splash, and they both continue to play the point underwater.

Nevertheless, the creators of the original Pocari spot feel the shot-by-shot comparisons are too strong. "We are stunned that something like this really happened," says Hasashi Nakano, exec producer at Pocari agency Asatu-DK's LA office. "It is certainly very upsetting."

There are also hard feelings at Level 7, the Los Angeles production company that created and produced the Pocari tennis spot and was one of three losing bidders on the Pacific Life job. The original director isn't happy either. Joel Peissig - now at Squeak Pictures in LA and the person who also earned a creative credit on the Pocari spot - feels the agency has displayed "utter audacity" by producing such a similar-looking commercial.

Harnett says he only discovered the Pocari spot by accident once he started looking for a director. He didn't contact Peissig because "he was then at RSA, and I didn't have the budget I thought they'd need." He'd also worked with Klarenbeck before, on a Honda campaign while at Rubin Postaer, so he was confident about the director's ability to deliver the goods. "I know Justin, and I know what he can do with effects."

For his part, Klarenbeck freely admits he went to school on Pocari. "Peissig is a great director, and it would have been silly not to look at his spot," says the director, who also used The Matrix and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon as choreography references. "I don't think I made a better spot, but I made one for a heck of a lot less money" - he says the Pacific Life budget was $408,000 US, two-thirds of the Pocari cost, even though the dry court opening sequence added a third day to the shoot.

Otsuka Pharmaceutical, Pocari's parent company, says Pocari has always been on the cutting edge of product development, as well as advertising and marketing. "This incident," Otsuka said in an e-mailed statement, "[demonstrates that] Pocari Sweat is really the pioneer in the industry."