“Rizwan”, Paper Boat

A short film which explores the powerful relationship between memory and the senses.

Brief

Paper Boat is a pioneer in the category of ethnic drinks. With the growing success of their products, they decided that it was time for a serious branding exercise. Their goal was to create a communication piece that would capture their personality as a brand, and generate high recall and engagement among their consumers.

Our Approach

Paper Boat’s brand identity is grounded in nostalgia. The best way to capture their ethos would be through a story – a story which not only brings out the personality of the brand but also highlights its positioning in terms of the connection between memory and our senses. We created a story called ‘Rizwan’, told by an old man, about a memory from his childhood. The film uses 2D animation and live action to create a sense of time and showcase the world as young Rizwan saw it, in all its magic. Only at the end of the film do we learn that Rizwan is blind, and that the world he lived in was built out of his imagination. This film is accompanied by an original music score.

Results

In less than two weeks, we had over 2 million views on YouTube, and 3500 shares on Facebook, with a massive positive response from viewers. In fact, Google even did a case study on our campaign, because it had the lowest cost per view rate in the history of YouTube advertising. Rizwan was the most watched ad on YouTube in May, 2016, according to Afaqs, and was one of Adage’s top three ads of the week when it was released. It also won multiple international awards and a silver Afaqs foxglove award.