About

Cinematic Subway Ad refers to a commercial for sandwich chain restaurant Subway which went viral in June of 2019 for its over-the-top cinematography and emotional tone. The ad is a two minute short film showing seminal events in the course of a man's life before he eventually walks up to a Subway counter to pick his sandwich.

Origin

The ad was directed by Guto Azevedo and Diego Claudino of Stink productions based out of Sao Paolo, Brazil.^[1] A one minute version was posted to Subway Brasil's YouTube channel on August 16th, 2016 (shown below)^[2] and the full version was posted to Vimeo two days later.^[1]

Spread

On June 27th, 2019, the commercial went viral on Twitter when user @Rysimmons tweeted the full commercial, adding the comment, "got another capitalism greatest hit. i will give you one hundred thousand dollars if you can guess the brand by the end," gaining over 5,800 retweets and 15,000 likes over the course of the next three hours (shown below).

The video quickly attracted bewildered commentary from viewers. Comedian Paul F. Tompkins^[3] quote-tweeted the video saying, "the ending is ASTONISHING," gaining over 130 retweets and 1,100 likes (shown below, left). Zoe Quinn^[4] wrote "holy shit what why" about the ad, gaining over 35 retweets and 220 likes in 45 minutes (shown below, right).

Others parodied the tone of the ad by writing parodies of it. For example, user @Julian_Epp wrote, "To live is to suffer. To survive is to find meaning in the suffering. Find meaning with Subway’s®️ new signature flatbread sandwiches™️,"^[5] gaining over 20 retweets and 200 likes in an hour (shown below, left). Washington Post writer Liz Bruenig^[6] joked about questions about the ad being asked at that evenings 2020 Democratic Primary debate (shown below, right). The ad was covered by Fast Company^[7] later that day.

Various Examples

Search Interest

Unavailable

External References