VIDEO Samsung promotes super-fast washer with 'slowest film' ever
Michael Nyman created an original score for the 66-minute movie about a wash cycle. / Courtesy of Samsung Electronics
By Chyung Eun-ju
Samsung’s 66-minute movie, “Washing Machine ― The Movie,” will be released on Tuesday in Leicester Square, London starring Samsung’s washing machine, QuickDrive with music by one of Britain’s most celebrated composers.
The “slow movie” will show a full wash cycle in one continuous shot to emphasize QuickDrive’s efficiency ― cutting the wash time in half “without compromising the cleaning performance.”
The soundtrack was composed by Michael Nyman, who also wrote the soundtrack for the Oscar-winning movie “The Piano.”
Trailer:
“In an audacious move, the poetic monotony of the spinning drum and sloshing water are the sole focus of 'Washing Machine' the movie," Samsung said in an online statement.
"The film chronicles the full cycle, moment by moment, of Samsung’s QuickDrive washing machine, in this big screen addition to the canon of slow cinema treats. The production team captured the action with a single long shot trained on the machine to bring the full glory of the wash, rinse and spin to the screen."
The film will be released in Leicester Square, London on Tuesday. / Courtesy of Samsung Electronics
British adults will watch the laundry cycle for 1,481 hours on average during their lifetime, according to Samsung’s research.
“The idea of this intrigued me when I was approached, putting a score to something so visually repetitive and prosaic,” said Nyman. “The challenge was to offset the mundanity and also enhance the hypnotic appeal.”
Nyman also mentioned that the world’s longest appliance advertisement comes 300 years after the premier of Handel’s “Water Music.”
“What better way to showcase the fastest washing machine we have ever made than to feature it in one of the slowest movies ever created, complete with a soundtrack from one of Britain’s most celebrated composers,” said Mark Seaman, who heads the domestic appliances department of Samsung UK and Ireland.
The movie follows a 200 second advertisement of the QuickDrive washing cycle shown during the hit Channel 4 show, “Gogglebox,” on Nov. 24. More than three million people viewed the advertisement, according to Samsung’s online statement.
The company described the advertisement as “a soulful ballet of technology in motion.”
The film will be available on Youtube on Wednesday.