66 Scenes from America

66 Scenes from America
Danish66 scener fra Amerika
Directed byJørgen Leth
Produced byOle John
CinematographyDan Holmberg
Edited byKristian Levring
Production
company
Release date
  • 26 March 1982 (1982-03-26) (Denmark)
Running time
42 minutes
CountryDenmark

66 Scenes from America (Danish: 66 scener fra Amerika) is a 1982 Danish documentary film directed by Jørgen Leth. It presents a variety of short scenes with no connecting narrative. People are shown engaged in ordinary activities with minimal direction.[1] Leth described it as containing "large and small things, events, people, thoughts and feelings".[2]

Synopsis

66 Scenes from America presents a variety of short scenes with no connecting narrative. People are shown engaged in ordinary activities with minimal direction.[1] Leth described it as containing "large and small things, events, people, thoughts and feelings".[2] Each scene typically contains a single shot and has no camera movement. At the end of each scene a narrator lists the location, such as "Lubbock, Texas", and occasionally names an object in the scene, such as in "The American Flag, Manhattan Beach, California". The mention of the object typically changes the viewer's perception of the scene; for example the American flag scene initially appeared to be focussed on a car in front of a house, but when the American flag is mentioned the viewer focusses on a waving flag in the background.[3] The narrator speaks in Danish, but contains so many place names and cognates that Alfred Guzzetti has said that it initially gave him "the illusion that the language is [English]".[4] The film has been described by The Telegraph as "paying homage to Warhol’s Screen Test films, in which a single subject ... is filmed from the neck up, in straight profile, saying little to nothing."[5]

Andy Warhol eats a hamburger

The film's best-known scene shows the artist Andy Warhol eating a Whopper hamburger from the fast food restaurant chain Burger King.[6] He eats the burger at a desk, in near silence.[7] The scene is 4+1⁄2 minutes long,[8] the longest scene in the film, in part because Warhol did not realize he was expected to say his name immediately after he finished eating, and Leth did not edit out the awkward pause that resulted.[6] In the scene Warhol shakes a bottle of Heinz Tomato Ketchup to consume with the burger, and quietly says at one point that "it doesn't come out". After eating the burger, Warhol packs the remaining food and the packaging away, and after an awkward pause, states "My name is Andy Warhol, and I just finished eating a hamburger."[8]

When making the film, Leth requested that his assistant get hamburgers without branding in their packaging, because he was concerned that Warhol would refuse to eat branded hamburgers because of his commercial value. When Warhol saw the three burgers that had been ordered, two being unbranded and one having Burger King branding, Warhol asked where the McDonald's hamburger was because he believed that it had the better design. Warhol chose to eat the Burger King burger and refused to eat the ones with unbranded wrappers.[9]

In 2014 The Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh began displaying the scene on their fourth floor, and was still displaying it in 2019.[10] The clip has been compared to Warhol's quote "What's great about this country is that America started the tradition where the richest consumers buy essentially the same things as the poorest."[7]

2019 Burger King advertisement

In 2019, over three decades after Warhol had died,[11] Burger King aired an excerpt from the scene as a commercial during Super Bowl LIII.[9][12] The advertisement is 45 seconds long and ends with the hashtag #EatLikeAndy[8] and the Burger King logo.[5] The Andy Warhol Foundation and representatives of Leth approved the use of the footage in the advertisement.[8] A week before the advert was released, Burger King gave customers who ordered their products via DoorDash a mystery box which contained, among other things, a white wig that had a similar appearance to the wigs of Warhol.[13]

Burger King's global chief marketing officer, Fernando Machado, has stated that he wished that the entire 4 minutes and 20-second scene would make it into the Super Bowl advertisement, but said that this would have been too expensive.[14] However, the company placed the full clip on their website.[15]

Steve Johnson of the Chicago Tribune ranked it as the fifth best 2019 Super Bowl commercial,[16] and The Washington Post chose it as one of the top 10 Super Bowl commercials of the year.[17] However, viewers surveyed by the consumer insights company Suzy ranked it as one of the year's five worst Super Bowl ads. Brandwatch counted over 11,000 mentions of the commercial on social media, with 55.5% being positive and 44.5% being negative.[15]

Johnson theorised that Heinz Tomato Ketchup would have appreciated the ad as their tomato sauce was prominently featured.[16]

References

  1. 1 2 Ørum, Tania (2007). "Danish Avant-Garde Filmmakers of the 1960s: Technology, Cross-aesthetics and Politics". In Graf, Alexander; Scheunemann, Dietrich (eds.). Avant-garde Film. Rodopi. p. 273. ISBN 978-90-420-2305-5.
  2. 1 2 "66 Scenes from America". International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam. Archived from the original on 7 February 2019. Retrieved 4 February 2019.
  3. ↑ "Playback: Jørgen Leth's '66 Scenes from America' | International Documentary Association". www.documentary.org. 28 September 2017. Retrieved 26 June 2026.
  4. ↑ Guzzetti, Alfred. "A Few Things for Themselves". New Literary History. 39 (2): 251–258. doi:10.1353/nlh.0.0029. ISSN 1080-661X.
  5. 1 2 "Never mind Game of Thrones: how Andy Warhol ate a burger and stole the Super Bowl". The Telegraph. 4 February 2019. Retrieved 5 July 2026.
  6. 1 2 Hjort, Mette; Bondebjerg, Ib (2003). The Danish Directors: Dialogues on a Contemporary National Cinema. Intellect Books. pp. 139-140.
  7. 1 2 "The Burger King® Brand Super Bowl Commercial Stars Andy Warhol". Business Wire. 4 February 2019. ProQuest 2175245619.
  8. 1 2 3 4 "Why Andy Warhol is Eating a Whopper in Burger King's Strange New Ad". Frieze. 4 February 2019. Retrieved 26 June 2026.
  9. 1 2 Dessem, Matthew (26 June 2026). "What Was Andy Warhol Doing in That Burger King Ad?". Slate. Archived from the original on 4 February 2019. Retrieved 4 February 2019.
  10. ↑ Harrop, Joanne Klimovich (4 February 2019). "We all know Pittsburgh native Andy Warhol had a fondness for Campbell's Soup". Pittsburgh Tribune. ProQuest 2175793017.
  11. ↑ Johnson, Steve (4 February 2019). "2019 Super Bowl commercials ranked: Watch them all here". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved 5 July 2026.
  12. ↑ Monllos, Kristina (3 February 2019). "How Burger King Turned Documentary Footage of Andy Warhol Eating a Whopper Into Its Super Bowl Ad". Adweek. Archived from the original on 4 February 2019. Retrieved 4 February 2019.
  13. ↑ Magazine, Q. S. R. (5 February 2019). "Burger King's Super Bowl Commercial Features Andy Warhol". QSR Magazine. Retrieved 26 June 2026.
  14. ↑ "ANDY HAS IT HIS WAY: Burger King brings Andy Warhol to Super Bowl advertising in a spot from a 1982 art film". AdAge. 4 February 2019. ProQuest 2176801769.
  15. 1 2 Taylor, Kate. "Burger King baffled and infuriated people with its Super Bowl ad starring Andy Warhol". Business Insider. ProQuest 2404662068. Retrieved 5 July 2026.
  16. 1 2 Johnson, Steve (4 February 2019). "2019 Super Bowl commercials: 5 best and 5 worst". Chicago Tribune. ProQuest 2175335427. Retrieved 5 July 2026.
  17. ↑ Judkis, Maura; Rao, Sonia (4 February 2019). "Analysis | The 10 best Super Bowl commercials, from Pepsi's self-own to the one good Bud Light ad". The Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 5 July 2026.
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