DMB&B has created an alternative anti-drink-drive ad to run
alongside its official Department of Transport Christmas campaign.
The chilling 40-second film breaks in London cinemas this weekend. It
opens with an array of surgical implements seen in X-ray before cutting
to show a driver’s view of the road at night.
Viewers then see the scene of an accident. An ambulanceman waves traffic
past as his colleagues deal with the aftermath of a collision. The face
of a weeping woman is intercut with shots of X-rayed limbs which have
had metal pins inserted and a surgeon cutting into young flesh.
Maimed and disabled victims of accidents are shown in a stark light.
A man’s T-shirt is taken off to reveal a stump instead of an arm, set
alongside a row of prosthetic limbs. Viewers are shown an industrial
tool cutting open a car and a young man being winched into a bath as his
useless legs slide into the tub.
The film ends with a jovial pub landlord asking, ’What will it be then?’
before the words ’You’ve got more to lose than your licence’ come up
accompanied by the 1997 campaign endline: ’Have none for the road’.
Steve Boswell and Steve Drysdale, the creative group heads responsible
for the anti-drink-drive account at DMB&B, devised the ad, which was
directed free of charge by Nick Wood at Brian Byfield Films. Free media
through Pearl & Dean was negotiated by MediaVest after the Department of
Transport gave the go-ahead.
Boswell explained: ’We wrote the script a year ago when the brief was
very much aimed at and about young men. This year’s campaign aims to
address a wider audience, but Nick Wood was mad keen to make the
commercial anyway and we felt it was important to see the project
through.’
