KEY POINTS:
If TV3 had to choose a programme that catches the image it wants in the world Target would run near the top of the list.
The consumer advice and protection show drips sharp camerawork and busy editing. It is rock video spread across solid lumps of information, going straight at the much fought over younger demographic, while scooping up a wider audience.
Hosts Brooke Howard-Smith and Jeanette Thomas mesh neatly with this, crossing high energy with a straightforward clarity.
In a typical episode last night the feature piece was plucked from a top 10 list of preferred magazine shows, catching the abled using disabled car parking spaces. Howard-Smith's cameras sprang several courier drivers, including one who declared the clearway regulations on Mt Eden Rd did not apply to couriers, as well as those dropping off children, and others making stops at shops, Lotto outlets, and bakeries.
He struck current affairs gold as one offender decided to flee. It made for great pictures with Howard-Smith legging after her, yelling his questions, while the bouncing camerawork added spice.
The show ran a taste test and assessment of four brands of peanut butter. As well as the subjective comments about smoothness, taste, etc, it gave detailed analysis; which contained the most protein, actual peanut content, and fat. The latter would startle parents of peanut butter-loving children. All the brands came in at around 50 per cent.
Target made its name with hidden camera footage of misbehaving tradesmen. This time the cameras watched glaziers installing a cat door at a private house. To make this exciting television, exposing actual malfeasance is required. Otherwise, it becomes what we wound up getting, sedate footage of men cutting and fitting glass. Even that staple of "crouching tradesmen" was missing, with all concealed by shirts overlapping trousers.
This makes the hidden camera material slightly problematical. Producers have gone to the trouble and expense of installing it, plus hiring an actor to play the cat door-wanting homeowner, and understandably want a return.
However, unless something devastating turns up, as happened in an early Target show, when a tradesman went through a chest of drawers, there is a slightly voyeuristic feel which eventually becomes uncomfortable to watch.
The show did catch one man who may come to wince at his letting fly with some spectacular double entendre.
But although it might have been ragingly politically incorrect, he did not go beyond it, and there was no accusation of spectacularly shoddy workmanship. He would also hand in a bill amounting to less than half that of his two competitors.
Jeanette Thomas wrapped up the show with an extraordinarily detailed assessment process for buying a second hand cycle. The good news is the part most likely to need replacing costs less than $3. Unfortunately, from there, bike repairs turn expensive. She summed up with a sensible sounding suggestion to aim for clearance sales at established bike shops.
* Target TV3 Tuesday 7.30pm; and Saturday, 4.00pm.
