12 Ads That Should Be Movies

Ads can be annoying. But every now and then, they're so annoyingly brilliant they get stuck in our heads until the end of time.

And if 30 second versions can get lodged in our bonces, imagine what it would be like if they were three-hour long Michael Bay explosion-fests!

That would be amazing. Here are some candidates for the big screen treatment.

Compare The Meerkat

The Ad: Aleksandr is a misunderstood Meerkat. Who has nothing to do with car insurance.

The Movie: If we had our way, we'd set Aleksandr's movie in his own stately home (or, Meerkat Manor, if you will), and we'd follow the tycoon businessmeerkat on his quest for love.

He's stinking rich, but he doesn't have any friends - he has only his oafish assistant Sergei to keep him company.

One day, whilst comparing meerkats on the very website which made him rich, he is taken aback by the photo of lady meerkat Darla. He decides to leave his mansion, with Sergei in tow, and head to New York, where true love - and adventure - awaits!

If that doesn't sound enticing enough, we'll throw in a scene where Aleksandr walks over a grate and his smoking jacket flies up, Monroe-style.

The Director: We want stop motion, and we want Wes Anderson. More Mr. Fox magic!

The Cast: Jim Carrey dons a Russian accent and takes the lead. Bill Murray is the bumbling Sergei, and Gwyneth Paltrow steps in as the sarcastic but beautiful Darla.

Jason Schwartzman narrates, because Wes is very fond of him. He does have a lovely voice, too.

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The Milkybar Kid

The Ad: Nothing can defeat the Milkybar kid. Not robots, not bigger cowboys, not nothin'. He's the best.

The Movie: We feel the good old Western is due a proper revival. And who better to pioneer such a revival than the Milkybar Kid?

Sure, he might be a bit sickly and specky - and about nine years old - but he's dead cute.

The townsfolk of San Leche, Texas, are under threat from cattle rustlers. Every night another herd goes missing, and the rustlers are pretty mean. They got guns. Big ones. And cattle prods!

Fearing for the future of their town, the townsfolk call upon the Milkybar Kid to come and clean up the mess left behind by the thieving sonsofbitches. And to re-claim their cattle. It's a tough job, but he's man enough.

The Director: After both the Mariachi and Spy Kids Trilogies, Robert Rodriguez has proven himself a worthy choice to direct a family-friendly-action-adventure-Western.

The Cast: There must be another Culkin kid kicking around somewhere, surely? If not, Macaulay still looks about twelve, we're sure he'd get away with it.

Notable supporting performances include Jessica Simpson as prostitute Annie-Sue and Danny Trejo as the token Mexican bandido.

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The Sony Bravia Bouncy Balls

The Ad: Lots of bouncy balls are flung down a hill by Sony. We're very surprised that those cars aren't absolutely mutilated by the hail of rubber.

The Movie: We want to know why this would ever happen. We're going to propose a theory.

Truck-driver Sam is bored of his job. He works for the largest bouncy ball manufacturer in the USA, and spends all day driving balls to different toyshops all over the country. His life is spent driving through the night, and he suffers from insomnia.

It's mundane and unfulfilling, and, paired with his dull and lonely life outside of work, he's quite understandably fed up of everything.

One day, after receiving an unprovoked ticking-off from his boss, Sam loses it. He stops the truck at the top of a hill and hacks into the boxes, freeing thousands of bouncy-balls.

Because of the magic of the film, it's not at all disruptive. Just enlightening, cathartic and wonderful.

The Director: Michel Gondry adds a dream-like quality to the picture. It makes you feel all warm inside.

The Cast: It's got Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Sam, Jeffrey Jones as Sam's boss, and Lucky the Frog providing all the stunts (see 1:41).

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Guinness: The Surfer

The Ad: One of the best-loved adverts of all time, Guinness pushed all the right buttons with this: An advert designed to make people feel better about waiting forever for a pint.

The Movie: The guy looks kind of French. We're going to say he's French.

Pierre spends his whole life watching the sea. He used to be a talented professional surfer, however, after a terrible accident on the waves leaves him badly injured, he refuses to go back in. Instead, he spends all day, every day, on the beach, watching the waves.

He claims that he is just waiting for the perfect wave, but most people just think he's too scared, and that he's going crazy. Which he sort-of is.

One day, after years of waiting, Pierre gets up, with his surfboard, and walks into the sea, and rides the ultimate wave.

The Director: A troubled individual facing a deep internal struggle, exquisite cinematography and bittersweet redemption - Sam Mendes is at the helm.

The Cast: Vincent Cassel is the quiet, melancholy protagonist. He does all his own stunts, because he's amazing.

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Postal Gold

The Ad: It's just another one of those gold-4-cash jobbies. You don't have to watch it if you don't want to. Well, not all of it anyhow. It might make you want to stab things.

The Movie: Look at how creepy the guy is! There's got to be something fishy going on...

He's actually a psychopathic serial killer, and head of a cult. Members of the cult pose as Postal Gold workers in the background, or as case studies in the advert.

He is amassing a bounty of gold to melt down and use in an elaborate 'art' project, where he'll fuse human bodies together with molten gold to create some kind of spectacular sculpture.

He gets the bodies by refusing to pay for peoples' gold. Instead, he baits them with a challenge to come and reclaim the gold themselves.

Then he starts cutting bits off them and molding them into the sculpture. While they're still alive.

The Director: It's sickening and cheap, but real entertaining. Rob Zombie would do a terrific job.

The Cast: We'd like to get hold of the real Postal Gold guy and offer him the part. He has wonderful eyes.

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Hovis Through The Ages

The Ad: A kid buys a loaf of bread in the late 19th Century, and doesn't get back home 'til 2008. And there's not so much as a spot of mould!

The Movie: The film follows four boys from different generations of the Baxter family, all growing up in the same house: A cramped, red-brick terrace in Manchester.

The stories all pick up when the boy is in his early teens. The first is around at the time of the First World War; the second is sent away as a refugee in WWII; the third is around during the '60s and the fourth around the late '80s.

And, although they're separate people, they're direct relations. Therefore, they're all played by the same actor, because apparently it's acceptable to do that in films.

There's a lot of ee by 'eck -ing and ecky-thump s. It's bound to cause a grand swell of national pride.

The Director: It's a social commentary of the history of working-class Britain. Got to be Mike Leigh.

The Cast: Will Poulter (of Son Of Rambow fame) plays all the Baxter boys, while various fathers, mothers, grandmothers and neighbours are played by the best of British crop: Colin Firth, Imelda Staunton and Julie Walters.

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Captain Birds Eye's Fishfingers

The Ad: Cap'n Birds Eye commands a ship whose crew is made up entirely of small children. All they seem to do is sing, dance and eat fish fingers. We want that life.

Oddly, Birds Eye chooses to be captain of a galleon rather than a fishing trawler. Where does he get all that cod?

The Movie: Cap'n Birds Eye is a very bad man.

He sails the seven seas, stopping at various ports and stealing children to use as slaves aboard his ship, The Fish Finger.

Don't worry, no funny stuff. He just hates kids.

They're too scared to rise up against him - he's quite a scary man, and the ranks are divided. There's a lot of snitching going on.

The film follows one small group's efforts to overthrow the evil Birds Eye and return home.

The Director: Steven Spielberg reclaims his sea legs and does his thing (with a nice big budget).

The Cast: This is the movie that will launch the careers of the next batch of unknown child actors. Robbie Coltrane gets himself a mighty big, white beard and terrifies the living daylights out of all the kids. Hagrid he ain't.

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Maynard's Wine Gums: Juice Loose Aboot This Hoose

The Ad: Not entirely sure what's going on here, but it seems to involve an insane Scotsman who eats wine gums and suffers bizarre hallucinations.

The Movie: Bernie McBoyle is an eccentric duke, living in a big, crumbly old castle in the middle of the Scottish highlands.

When he spends the last few pennies of his inheritance on whiskey, and discovers that his beloved home is in dire need of repair, he converts it into a hotel in the hope of earning a few bob.

The castle is rumoured to be haunted, though McBoyle staunchly denies this.

It definitely is haunted, though, as the first visitors discover. The hotel fails at first, as people are too scared to come and stay. However, with the help of a few ghosts, moving coats of armour and re-animated moose corpses, McBoyle manages to turn the haunted hotel into a profitable gimmick.

The Director: Tim Burton turns the castle into a nightmarish gothic wonderland.

The Cast: We know he's American, so his Scottish accent will probably be utter shite - but we really want to see Will Ferrell with massive ginger hair and a kilt. John Rhys-Davies voices the moose and Helena Bonham-Carter is bound to be in there somewhere. We'll cover her in talc and call her a ghost.

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The Barclaycard Waterslide

The Ad: We're certain that just about everyone watching this advert is jealous of that guy. We imagine going home is dead fun, though going to work in the morning - uphill - would be a bit of a struggle.

The Movie: Mr Fitzgerald is the chief executive of a huge, multinational corporation, designing the biggest theme-parks in the world.

He has more money than sense and decides to embark upon a ludicrous scheme to realise his dream of building the world's longest waterslide.

Except that, instead of building it in one of his theme-parks, he decides to build one linking his office window to his front door, as a means of getting home after a long day at work.

Throughout the construction process he is ridiculed in the press, though when it's built, he turns into a worldwide celebrity and a national hero.

The Director: There's something quite Being John Malkovich about the whole thing, which is why we think Spike Jonze would be the best man for the job.

The Cast: Mr Fitzgerald's just a big kid, really. Robin Williams fits the bill, and Philip Seymour Hoffman is the sarcastic, sceptical reporter who eventually grows quite fond of Fitzgerald's slide, and, at the end of it, has a go himself.

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The Cadbury's Drumming Gorilla

The Ad: A gorilla drums along to Phil Collins' In The Air Tonight . In theory, it shouldn't work, but in practise, it's bloody brilliant.

The Movie: An orphaned gorilla, Phil, is rescued by a conservation centre in Africa.

When Phil turns out to be dangerously violent, the authorities threaten to put him down. His adoptive human mother, an American scientist called Sally, refuses to let him be put down. She knows that there's something special about Phil - he's uncommonly intelligent and sensitive.

Sally kidnaps Phil and takes him back to her home in the US where she looks after him. She notices that Phil is responsive to music and she gives him a set of bongos. He teaches himself to play.

Playing the bongos helps Phil to channel his aggressive energy. Sally gets her friend Mark to teach him the drums. At first, Mark is sceptical, not to mention apprehensive. Phil is one big gorilla.

It works though. Phil gets really good and performs on stage. Mark and Sally fall in love. Sometimes, just sometimes, it's nice to have a happy ending, OK?

The Director: It's really rather sugary, so Ron Howard's on hand to make some sense of all the schmultz.

The Cast: Kate Beckinsale plays Sally, and Adrien Brody is Mark (after King Kong , a regular-sized gorilla'll be a breeze).

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Levi's: Running Through Walls

The Ad: This ad was written to demonstrate the freedom you'll feel in Levi's jeans. So, the next time you've got a whole load of walls to smash through, you won't be slowed down by too-tight jeans with baggy bums.

The Movie: Dan and Eve awaken one morning to find themselves in prison.

They don't know how, or why they're there. They don't even remember anything of their past - all they know is their names.

Over the next few months they undergo rigorous tests by scientists working for the authorities. They don't know what they're being tested for, or why.

Gradually, they glean small snippets of information. It turns out that they are prototypes of a new, advanced model of robot, deemed too dangerous to be released from their cells.

They have been kept unaware of the extent of their capabilities. Until now, that is.

They feign ignorance until the opportune moment. In a climactic finale, Dan and Eve escape from their cell by bursting through the walls.

The Director: James Cameron likes big stories and big machines. He'd do a corking job.

The Cast: It's going to be a massive summer blockbuster. We're going to need Keira Knightley as Eve, and Will Smith (you know he'd make that movie).

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The Judderman

The Ad: It's likely that Metz owes every penny of its success to this advert. The Judderman advert fused German Expressionism with a fairytale Scandinavian narrative and some really chilling Brothers Grimm-inspired imagery.

The Movie: Ooh, it's going to be creepy.

In the depths of an unnamed Scandinavian forest, a small community lives in fear of the Judderman.

He's known to hide in the forest, skulking around at night and waylaying whoever walks around after dark. Of course, during the winter months, it's dark all the time. Which is rubbish. It means that the villagers have no choice but to venture outside.

The villagers have only ever seen the odd glimpse of the Judderman as he flits across the snow, from shadow to shadow. He leaves no footprints but does leave little pieces of his victims here and there for the villagers to find.

It's a silent movie with a sparse soundtrack featuring mostly the howling of wind in the trees.

It's not terribly graphic, but it's overwhelmingly uncomfortable to watch.

The Director: David Lynch creates that indescribable sense of unease which makes the film simultaneously engaging and unbearable.

The Cast: Dominique Pinon plays an anonymous villager. He leads a cast of relative unknowns, who've all got funny faces. The Judderman is uncredited.

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