The TV commercials for a new chocolate bar called M'azing show people doing amazing things in order to earn a bar of M'azing chocolate. In one commercial a guy balances a washing machine on his jaw. In another one a girl twists her legs all the way around her body in a way that really doesn't look possible.
You can see all the ads here (quicktime and wmv format). Someone wrote in to Stuart Elliott's advertising column in the NY Times asking if the movie with the girl doing the thing with her legs was real. Elliott says it is. This is his exact response:
Stuart Elliott: The gymnast in the commercial is really performing what you see on screen, according to the Masterfoods division of Mars in Hackettstown, N.J., which markets the new M'azing line of candy. The spot, called "Mystic Pixie," is indicative of the direction of the campaign, which is to celebrate people whose talents enable them to perform feats that are truly amazing. The performers are, of course, meant to personify the amazing taste of M'azing. The campaign is created by the flagship New York office of BBDO Worldwide, part of the Omnicom Group.
Comments
Next we'll hear that it's simply impossible that someone could really break a board with their bare hands, breathe fire, walk a tightrope over a waterfall, be shot out of a cannon or wrestle a bear. Must all be done with CGI, right?
What a banal, colorless world some would have us live in. Geez, what would they think if they saw Tod Browning's "Freaks"?
People suck. 😜
Any good gymnast can do this - in fact, any person - who doesn't eat too many chocolate bars and watch too many movies while sitting on the sofa should be able to do it!
I call bullpoopie. That's like saying that any person can walk a tightrope.
Yeah, if they have a certain natural degree of gifted agility, and practice for years beforehand, sure. But that's not the same as any random person getting up off the couch right now and walking across a tightrope. Without agility and training, you fall on your ass.
Not everyone is as flexible (or even as potentially flexible) as everyone else.
I have a pretty good documentary on tape called "The Twisted Lives of Contortionists". Bottom line: you have to be BORN that way to do most of that stuff (stepping through an unstrung tennis racket, or the two-asses-in-a-tube trick those Asian guys do on that other M-Azing commercial). Whether you put in the training and practice to make a career out of it is another matter, but still.
I wasn't born that way - I'm no professional just limber and fit and got lumbered with the usual few years of ballet school when small. Swimming yoga dancing riding. It takes much less balance to stand on one's hands than to walk a tightrope (which is easy compared to slackrope)any gymnast can do it. It is the speeding up of the film that makes it appear impossible. Many people say they can't touch their toes, but if they try daily and aren't such pillocks as to regard the stretching of unused ligaments as "pain" they find that within a week they can touch their toes, a fortnight and they can put their hands flat on the floor. One doesn't have to limber the spine to the rear while standing, the same effect is achieved while lying prone and pushing up like a press up while keeping the pelvis flat to the floor - the Cobra position. Get off the sofa and try it!
Shouldn't worry too much though, you're a normal young man.
The College of Cardinals has just picked a new pope who, according to the National Catholic Reporter's own Abuse Tracker (http://ncronline.org/) is supposedly due to appear in an abuse trial in Texas. That'll be interesting!
Now get back to work.
Enjoy
Any person that stretches and trains enough can touch the tips of toes to the ground but you have to be a contortionist to put your whole foot on the ground
That is entirely possible, and you dont have to be born with any special spine, trust me. I have a normal body, but I work hard to be flexible, as can anyone else. That is how I am able to do the things that she does in the commercial.
Anyone that stretches and trains enough, providing they do not have any physical limitations, can touch their feet to the ground in a chest stand.
Everyone's body and bone structure are built differently, thus it is much easier for some people to achieve that goal than others, but for the most part, natural talent and flexibility makes up only about %.. the rest is dedication.
Contortionists become such through training. There does exist a condition of hyper mobility, where people are just naturally flexible without much work. However, such people generally require extra strength development in order to prevent injury, and to attain body control that is required of a handbalancing contortionist.
And they do have a contract with cirque du soleil.