Sean Connery`s Scottish tourism ad: brave move or just more Braveheart

A Scottish government ad aims to boost tourism - but does it just repeat the same old clichés, asks The Guardian.

The Scottish government has launched a TV ad featuring stars including actors Sir Sean Connery and Brian Cox, triple Olympic gold medallist Chris Hoy and singers Lulu and Sandi Thom.

Set to run in Scotland for a week and possibly the rest of the UK later this year, the ad also includes Scottish rugby players, golfer Sam Torrance and singers Amy Macdonald and Eddi Reader.

Click here to view the video online (via The Guardian).

They sing snippets of Dougie Maclean's song Caledonia in front of famous locations such as Edinburgh castle and the Orkney islands to promote the Homecoming Scotland 2009 campaign.

The initiative, based around a series of 200 events to mark the 250th anniversary of national bard Robert Burns, aims to encourage people living in Scotland to invite friends and family from all over the world to "come home" next year.

While any campaign that will give Scottish tourism a shot in the arm should be applauded, the ad seems to fall back on the same old clichés about Scotland. It only needs a few more shots of highland cattle or swinging sporrans to tick all the familiar boxes as it heads towards its rousing bagpipe chorus.

Do shots of castles, highland valleys and golf courses really reflect real life in Scotland today? Where is the city life? There's a shot of Glasgow Science Centre, but where are Edinburgh's festival or Glasgow's galleries?

It might have been braver to offer younger Scottish film-makers, artists or musicians such as Fife's Fence Collective (from which sprung KT Tunstall) the chance to give a fresher take on Scottish culture today.

It's great that successful young Scots such as Chris Hoy or Amy Macdonald are included, but most of the stars just look uncomfortable, shot in green screen and plonked in front of postcard-style landscapes. Sam Torrance in particular looks nonplussed as he stands with his hands in his pockets at Turnberry, doubtless at a loss what to do without a nine iron.

And Sean Connery's mumbling is certainly not a patch on his performance in 1950s leprechaun movie Darby O'Gill and the Little People - though his Irish accent in that film is one he'd perhaps prefer to forget.

So, if you live outside the country does watching the ad make you want to head for the highlands? And if you're Scottish does it make you want to invite your friends and family back from abroad?

Discuss this news here...