The tagline for this year’s recently concluded Whistler Film Festival was “Prepare for the unexpected,” and Dare Vancouver took that theme to heart with some unpredicatable storytelling and media choices.
As an example, one animated video ad opens in typical Disney fashion with a beautiful maiden in a tower, a chirping bird and a suitor on a big white horse. It quickly turns dark.
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“Mainstream movies are predictable with the same stories told time and time again,” said Rob Sweetman, executive creative director at Dare. “Hardcore film buffs want to discover something that hasn’t been seen before and be the first one to see it.”
The campaign ventured into untraditional media territory as well; what appeared to be a chainsaw ad on Craigslist that lists the saw’s technical specs launches into a tale about disposing of a body. And outside a Vancouver condo building that’s under construction, Dare placed a typical-looking hoarding sign with the headline “Wouldn’t you like to live here?” above a picture of a happy couple and a price point. The copy, however, tells a story about how the site used to be a prison and how the inmates would break out of cells that were the same size as the condo.
Sweetman said the festival had two target audiences: the L.A. industry crowd targeted through print and online executions, and the Vancouver experimental film buff willing to pay for a five-night stay at the resort town.
“What both of these audiences have in common is they want something totally fresh and totally new,” said Sweetman.
This marked the festival’s 11th year and attendance was estimated at more than 8,200.
Sweetman said the next step is to do a branding exercise as organizers work to expand the festival into something along the lines of Park City, Utah’s Sundance Film Festival, which screened 118 films and had an estimated attendance of more than 60,000 last year.
