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| Source: Singtel. Stills from the festive video about always making the right connections. |
Singtel has launched its annual short film for Chinese New Year, celebrating the season’s spirit of making connections and strengthening ties with humour. Titled His Grandfather’s Road*, the light-hearted film centres on road rage between two families that ends on a high note when they realise that they have a lot more in common than they thought.
It’s the first day of Chinese New Year, and in typical Singaporean fashion, the two families are caught up in visiting relatives and friends. En route, their cars meet on a narrow street and come to a halt. Neither wants to budge.
Both sides confront each other, but thanks to a nosy passerby, scurry back to their cars. They decide to wait it out with the help of mobile entertainment - streaming video, playing online games and listening to music. The stalemate is broken in an unexpected way, ending in a traditional lohei.
Lian Pek, Singtel’s VP for Group Strategic Communications and Brand said, “Chinese New Year is the perfect occasion to reinforce Singtel’s long-held values of celebrating connections that count. Hence, this simple tale of two feuding families who discover they need to be more expansive and 'make the right connections' with each other - the film’s tagline.
"Of course, as a company, we’re very much about providing high quality and reliable connectivity services that cater to our customers’ changing lifestyles and expectations. So that gets a playful plug too. You can be stuck anywhere, but thanks to technology, life goes on!”
His Grandfather’s Road is part of Singtel’s on-going branded content strategy, centred around short film campaigns that have allowed the group to bring its brand values to life. Singtel’s Christmas film, The Gift, attracted close to 13 million views over its month-long screening, with numerous news media calling the film “heart-warming”.
“We’re very encouraged by the traction that our films are getting as they’re really bringing home what Singtel’s brand values are all about. While we’ve changed gears this festive season, moving away from our trademark poignant films with emotive storylines, we believe our light-hearted offering still allows us to affirm our values of family, community and inclusivity, served up with a good dash of humour!” added Lian Pek.
Conceptualised in-house and produced in collaboration with Akanga Film Asia, the film will air on Singtel TV and various social media channels from 3 January, and in cinemas from 16 to 29 January.
Details:
Watch the video
*A phrase Singaporeans sometimes use with sarcasm to describe drivers who behave as if they own the road.
