Silent picture set in a village in southern France. Accordion music plays as a librarian trots down the dirt path leading to the small stone library, which is on fire. The film flashes to a little boy on a bike and an old man peeling an apple. The librarian shouts (silently) for help and the entire village rushes to action, lining up at the town’s sole pump each holding a bucket. One strong looking villager stand at the pump to produce a stream of water, but the well appears to be very close to empty and only a trickle can be produce. For a moment it seems like dire circumstances until one villager takes a bucket, goes into the cottage, fills the bucket with fire and hands the bucket down the line. He fills many buckets and hands them down the line of villagers where they are eventually smothered or quenched under the trickle. The commercial ends with the words “Be more inventive. PBS.”
Agency: Fallon Minneapolis Bruce Bildsten, executive creative director; Mike Gibbs, group creative director; Gerard Caputo, art director; Dean Buckhorn, copywriter; Brian DiLorenzo, director of broadcast production; Robert van de Weteringe Buys, executive producer; Nicholas Gaul, associate producer. Production Company: Independent Media E. Elias Merhige, director; Bruno DeBonnel, DP; Susanne Preissler, executive producer; L. Skutch, line producer; David Brisbin, production designer. Benito Cine, Santiago. Veronica Figueroa, producer. Shot on location in Curtiduria, Chile.
Editorial: Whitehouse Post Productions, New York Rick Lawley, editor; Dan Maloney, assistant editor; Corina Dennison, senior producer Postproduction: The Mill New York,THE MILL, London Hitesh Patel, visual effects supervisor; Fergus McCall and Paul Harrison, Telecine artists; Phil Crowe, lead Flame artist; Ivor Griffin, CG animator; Tom Poole, Telecine assistant; Adam Grint and Richard Betts, Flame assistants; Helen W
Top Spot of the Week: Westerman Jilya Institute, Apparent, Director Warwick Thornton Tackle Mental Health Crisis
Leading Australian Aboriginal voices, creatives and mental health professionals have come together to launch an awareness initiative focused on the staggering rate of suicide in First Nation communities.
This short film, titled Change Direction, directed by filmmaker Warwick Thornton, with support from advertising agency Apparent and production company Photoplay, explores the role culture can play in reversing the crisis.
The Westerman Jilya Institute for Indigenous Mental Health, founded by psychologist Dr. Tracy Westerman AM (Nyamal, indigenous Austrlian people of the Pilbara area of northwestern Western Australia), partnered with Aboriginal creative talent including Thornton (Kaytetye), poet Dakota Feirer (Bundjalung-Gumbaynggirr), actor Pedrea Jackson (Jingili-Mudburra-Waramungu) and songman Fred Leone (Butchulla), to develop a campaign aimed at the hearts and minds of all Australians.
The campaign, led by the short film, aims to change the direction of Aboriginal mental health by pointing to Jilya’s solution: more Aboriginal psychologists to improve screening and suicide prevention within Aboriginal communities. The Institute funds scholarships for Indigenous people in high-risk communities to become psychologists in places that desperately need them, with a vision to “build an army” of Indigenous psychologists.
Beyond raising awareness, the campaign will seek donations to help fund the scholarships.
The short film centers on a poem, written in collaboration between Apparent and Dakota Feirer, using a palindrome to turn a negative narrative to positive through the power of cultural connection.
Hamish Stewart, CCO at Apparent, said, “Our team is committed to doing something to help address an issue... Read More