By Malay Desai
From: Belgium,by BBDO Belgium
With nine months to go for Euro 2016, arguably the biggest football competition after the World Cup, a condom brand is asking men to use its product for a month, to avoid pregnancy and delivery during game time next year. In the film, a regretful, middle-aged man is shown reminiscing the time when had to be in a hospital ward attending to his wife while his national team was creating history. The film is a mockumentary, with the man telling his story, interspersed by old footage of ecstatic fans. In the end, he assures that ‘our country is going to win’, followed by the branding.
Why we Like?
What in the world would you leave witnessing the delivery of your child for? Of course, for absolutely nothing, most men would say – but if you are hard-pressed for an answer, you might say ‘for millions of rupees’ or perhaps ‘to save dozens of lives’. But for a football game? Welcome to Europe.
Like I have mentioned earlier, brands that sell to a single gender have it easy – define the behaviours of your TA and exaggerate them to sell an idea.The license to be offensive to the other gender (not in the current Indian definition) can be freely used because there’s minimum to no damage to sales possible. So in fact, in cases of ads talking to men, the beer-guzzling, TV watching sexist guy feels like James Bond.
In this case, he’s only a poor innocent football fan. And a fan so dedicated, he even remembers the bar stool he was on when his national team achieved its best ever finish at a World Cup, in 1986. Of course, Belgium did not win that year (the infamous edition of the ‘hand of God’) but the semi-final place was an epoch enough. None of what the fan did is real though, for this is a mockumentary.
And like Phil Dunphy of Modern Family says it straight into the camera, this 50-something does it too: Bluntly spurt out that one must not make the same mistake he made – time the conception so as to keep free during the Euro month. Illogical – maybe? Hilarious – definitely!The three-minute mockumentary carries much punch, as it goes deep into the man’s regret – by showing his car, his failed video recording and much more.
Now, my advice to desi condom brands: our sanghisarkar might push you out of primetime, so start thinking for the web. There’s a world cup of possibilities out there!
(To watch this film,feed this link in your browser - bit.ly/October_12)
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