THE BUILDING WAS THE EASY PART.

A landmark redevelopment was complete. The film had to make people invest in what came next.

• THE SITUATION

One of Johannesburg’s long-established institutions had just completed a multimillion-rand redevelopment of its landmark home. The project meant more to the people it serves than new architecture. It had brought previously separate groups under one roof and generated an energy the institution hadn’t felt in years, at a time when many of them had quietly begun to wonder about their long-term future in South Africa. Against that uncertainty, the redevelopment was a tangible statement of intent: we are here, we are investing, and we are building for the next generation.

By the time the film was commissioned, the construction was done. What remained was the harder task of getting people emotionally and financially invested in what the institution wanted to become.

• THE THINKING

The obvious film, a beautiful showcase of a beautiful building, would have worked against the campaign. Footage celebrating a finished building invites an audience to admire it, and admiration leaves people as spectators. The campaign needed them to feel like participants, with something of their own at stake in what happened next.

The film needed to change what viewers understood the redevelopment to mean, so that they saw a future being built and a place for themselves in it. That understanding set the terms for every production decision. The building would appear throughout, but as evidence of the vision, never as the subject.

• WHAT WAS MADE

A flagship campaign film, developed and produced end to end: story development, storyboarding, architectural cinematography, interviews, directing, music curation, and substantial editing and post-production.

The production had a delicate balance to strike. It needed the polish and scale to honour a landmark redevelopment, and the audiences who knew the building best would have noticed if it fell short. Too much architectural spectacle, though, would have crowded out the people, and it is the people who make an audience feel something. In practice, the building establishes scale early in the film, and then the faces, voices and stories take over. The edit and the music were sequenced to build towards the campaign’s actual ask, which was belief in a future rather than applause for a building.

Target met, then exceeded

THE FUNDRAISING CAMPAIGN THE FILM WAS MADE FOR

• WHAT CHANGED

The film formed part of the institution’s broader fundraising campaign, and the campaign went on to meet and then exceed its target.

One piece of context completes the story, though it is not a result the film can claim. The future the campaign asked people to invest in has since become visible in the ordinary life of the institution, which today is busy through the week and increasingly full of young families.

A film built to turn admiration into investment.

• CASE 02 • END