What’s surprising about a phone call?

An old man makes a phone call enquiring about his loved ones. There is nothing unusual about it, except for the fact that the telephone cord is cut off.

Think about it: around 37 per cent of India’s elderly live a lonely life. And this is the message that a film for HelpAge India has tried to bring out. The film is presently running on channels such as Ten Sports, India TV, NDTV 24x7 and NDTV India, and talks are on with the STAR Network to run the film under STAR Care. It is also running in multiplexes such as PVR Cinemas and Cinemax. This film has been created by Manish Bhatt and Raghu Bhat (both creative directors at McCann Erickson).

The film opens on the shot of an old man, seated in his house. He picks up the telephone receiver and dials a number. After waiting for a while, he speaks into the phone, “Hello…Kantaprasad bol raha hoon. Happy Anniversity! Haan…aur theek hai? Sandhya bata rahi thi ki uske husband ki transfer ho gayi hai….haan. Pinky bolne lagi hai? Zara Pinky se baat karaiyo…”

After a brief pause: “Hello Pinky! Beta kaisi ho? Theek hoon. Haan…Diwali ki mithaai mere liye kidhar hai? Kya agle saal laogi? …acha…. Mummy ko sataana nahin!”

Then, quite abruptly, he says, “Achha rakhoon? Ok.” As the man ends his conversation, the camera moves away from the old man and slowly focuses on the telephone cord, which has been cut off. The old man was all this while talking to himself.

A super then comes on: ‘37 per cent of India’s aged live alone. And die alone’. Another super slides in revealing what the ad is about: HelpAge India (the NGO that works for the cause of aged people), with a call-to-action number appearing alongside.

The TVC shot by Shoojit Sircar of Red Ice Films leaves its mark on viewers, compelling them to think about the state of the lonely elderly in India.

This film was conceptualised two years ago, when an unfortunate incident in Mumbai took place. Raghu Bhat explains, “Back then, we read something in the newspaper about an old Christian man in Bandra who died in his home.” The sad part of the story was that since the man lived alone (with a pet dog as his sole companion), his body was discovered seven days later when his neighbours complained about a peculiar smell from the house. To make matters worse, extreme hunger led the pet dog to feed on his master’s body.

“Such is the state of most aged in India. This incident really shook us, and we knew we had to do something about it,” Manish Bhatt remarks. The idea took inspiration from a scene in the Bollywood film, ‘Koun’, in which actor Urmila Matondkar (who is shown to be mentally unstable) talks on a phone, whose cord has been ripped off.

“We felt that something like that fitted very well with our scheme,” explains Bhatt, “Here, we have tried to bring out the fact that old people tend to talk to themselves, when they are faced with depressive thoughts and loneliness.”

The ad also raises the issue of the sad financial state of the elderly, which is probably why the telephone line is shown to be disconnected. “The disconnection of the telephone line is quite similar to the way that the aged feel disconnected from their families and the rest of the world,” Raghu Bhat says.

The entire film is based on the insight that the elderly tend to feel isolated and useless as their families consider them to be a burden in several cases. They constantly seek interaction with another life form, which is why the elderly tend to keep pets, or grow plants in their homes, or even talk to themselves, to alleviate their loneliness.

Taking a cue from all this, the Bhatt and Bhat team approached Sircar, who not only agreed to shoot the film, but also financed it.

Contrary to the usual advertising process, there was no client brief given. After the film was shot, it was shown to HelpAge India, which agreed to lend its logo and helpline number and it was added later.

HelpAge India recently conducted a study on the plight of the elderly, and found out that one out of every eight old persons in India feels that no one cares about their existence. In addition, 13 per cent of the aged feel trapped in their own homes. And the shocking truth is this: close to 60 per cent of the aged respondents in metros (particularly in Delhi and Mumbai) lead lonely lives, perhaps due to the emergence of nuclear families.

Nidhi Rajkapoor, director, communications, HelpAge India, says, “It’s quite a coincidence that Manish, Raghu and Shoojit created this film which is based exactly on our findings. Our cause and their creative idea matched perfectly.”

Sircar says that while shooting the film, fine nuances such as the old man saying “Anniversity” instead of “Anniversary”, or the fact that he talks fast in an unnatural high-pitch, were retained to give a natural feel.

“Kishan, the man who played out this role, isn’t a professional actor,” Sircar says. “He fumbled on several words at places. But we kept that in the film. The reason is, old people generally talk fast when they have a lot to say, and don’t want to burden their family with a high telephone bill. In fact, that is why the man hangs up abruptly.”

The ad film hopes to bring about a behavioural change, as well as induce people to report such situations about the old. They may even donate a sum for the cause through the helpline. This communication particularly targets college goers and young professionals, who are too caught up in their own lives to pay any heed to the aged in their families.

“Social changes of this nature take time, but at least this is a start,” Rajkapoor says optimistically. Although the film was developed two years ago, it was only recently that it went on air, as it took time to arrange everything with the channel heads.

It may be food for thought that in places such as Siberia, solitary confinement is a form of punishment for criminals.

© 2006 agencyfaqs!