As teen boy fantasies go, the Guy Ritchie-directed "The Next Level" spot for Nike Football, which traces the triumphs and travails of a young footballer plucked from amateur obscurity and dropped into quasi-superstardom, is the stuff they're made of.

In this two-minute tale by L.A.'s 72andSunny and produced by Anonymous Content, from first frame to last, the viewer is not merely a witness but the young hero himself, living the dream as an eager, hard-training, potentially glory-bound footballer.

Approached with the brief last November, the agency had a relatively short turnaround time (four months from pre-production to airdate), a clear target (16 -to-19 year-old serious but amateur players), and a straightforward insight (play hard, work hard and get better at playing football).

As the storyboard and script took shape the choice of director quickly became apparent, says 72andSunny CD Bryan Rowles. Ritchie's fun, fast and narrative-led filmmaking style, as seen in films such as Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, was the natural fit, but landing him would be part design, part crapshoot. "It was just, 'Let's send it to him, he might be into it,'" says Rowles. "There were people in mind that we could've had, but he was the first one that everyone felt, yeah, he could be really awesome doing this."

After receiving the script, Ritchie was eager to take on the project, according to Dave Morrison, partner/head of commercials at Anonymous Content. "It wasn't just [about] Guy liking it, the agency liked Guy for it," he says. "They knew the kind of things he'd bring to it from his films, whether it's an attitude, little vignettes, or little details."

The story begins at a youth match in Anywhere, UK. Our young amateur's winning free kick is witnessed by Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger.

What unfolds - with the Eagles of Death Metal's "Don't Speak" as the soundtrack - is a dreamy, furiously-paced football fantasy smattered with realism. He's handed a spanking-new uniform, plays a lackluster first game, trains, frolics a little (we see him exiting a limo surrounded by autograph seekers with requisite babe in tow) and returns to the pitch a better player. All the while, marquee players, including Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Ruud Van Nistelrooy and Ronaldinho swirl around him, their signature moves in full display.

Notably less glamourous moments include our protagonist spitting a bloody tooth into his hand and upchucking after a particularly intense workout, which, not incidentally, were Ritchie's touches. "He added a lot of those human moments that gave a bit of humor. Then all of a sudden we're back into football, which was a good balance," says Rowles.

"The ending was also one of the big things that Guy brought to the table; it book-ended the film," Rowles adds. "Starting with the amateur league goal kick and ending on the moment before he fires on the net, on the international stage, and leaving it open as to whether or not he makes [the shot] felt like a nice punctuated ending."

How to capture the in-your-skin, first-person feel was the only real production challenge, says Morrison. After some trial and error they settled on a lightweight HD 2K camera, strapped to an actual player's forehead, to avoid running out of film in the middle of a sequence. It also allowed for on-set shot review and easy deletion, if needed. "We wanted it to look real. [You can't] do that with Steadicam [or] big rigs. If you do it with a lipstick camera the quality sucks, so while we wanted good quality, we wanted our player to have complete freedom of movement."

The agency's Amsterdam office served as pre-production home base, and made for easy city-hopping during the six weeks earmarked for shooting. Stops were necessary in Barcelona, London and Manchester to accommodate players' schedules (they shot for 12 days) and scenes were tightly choreographed and storyboarded to capture each player's signature move or attitude. "We were always shooting through the filter of, 'Is that real? Is that authentic?'" says Rowles.

Post-production, which initially took place at London's The Works and later at Los Angeles' SpotWelders over six weeks, was a relative breeze, says Sam Baerwald, 72andSunny's head of film production. Volume was the only real issue. "With so many versions to knock out for different regions, we were cutting for a while and had to explore pretty much every inch of what we shot," he says.

The result? About 20 versions for global consumption - everything from teasers to the two-minute spot which debuted April 29 during the Champions League semi-final match between Manchester United and FC Barcelona. Next up is a series which will run during the European Championships in June. Ritchie is also working on an extended edit of the original.

And while we may think that those in the ad biz have seen it all, it seems even well-worn ad types are subject to moments of school-boy reverie. "There's this amazing skill move by Ronaldinho [in the ad]," says the agency's brand manager Alex Schneider. "He'd done some great stuff, and then there's one particular move where he volleys the ball over a couple of defenders before hitting a no-look pass over to the right-hand side of the pitch.

"It was so incredible that during the shoot we kind of forgot ourselves," he continues. "Everybody got up and applauded. He promptly left the pitch having done a great job."

Anonymous Content http://www.anonymouscontent.com
72andSunny http://www.72andsunny.com
Nike Football http://www.nikefootball.com