2022 Winners & Shortlists

Write a short summary of what happens in the film

The film promoting Connect’s wireless bundle showcases a couple living in a small village in Norway. It starts off with a woman serving her husband a new and unfamiliar dish, encouraging him to try it. He thinks the food is delicious and asks where it’s from. The wife says she learned it from a woman living in a remote village in Lebanon. He asks what’s the dish, she replies “sheep testicles”. The husband was shocked. Upon realizing what he just ate, he naturally vomits everything and goes into a panic. After that, a voice-over says that anyone can be an “influencer” and share their own culture with the world with the help of Connect’s wireless bundle, closing with the tagline: “Let the world follow you” ("خلّي العالم يتابعِك"). A comedic post-pack shot then shows the husband asking, “where the hell did you get the testicles from?!”

Cultural / Context information for the jury

Lebanon has one of the slowest internet speeds in the world. Unfortunately, there was nothing that the people could do, as the telecommunications market in the country has always been dominated by two main players: MTC Touch and Alfa. Despite their lackluster service and frequent shutdowns, their large market share had driven many small yet effective competitors out of business, and consumers had no choice but to use their expensive services. There was, however, a group of people that were quite difficult to reach: people living in the country’s remote villages who mainly cared about their close-knit communities, and more importantly, being the village “star”. Connect, a low-cost brand that sells Internet packages for areas with poor connectivity, had an opportunity to enable these villagers to become “stars” by connecting with the world and sharing one essential part of their identity: their traditional recipes.

Please tell us about the social behaviour and / or cultural insights that inspired your work

Our target audience was a difficult one: Lebanese villagers who were not even willing to purchase an Internet connection, a challenge for a brand that was aiming to do exactly that. They didn’t really care about being connected to the world, but rather focused on their own close-knit communities. Just like any small and remote village in the world, Lebanese villages had a social hierarchy; being the most important person, or the “star”, of the village was something everyone aspired to be. Normally, these positions would be leadership positions, but what if we could shift that? Lebanese villages were known for their traditional foods that would give people a stroke just by hearing their name, from goat testicles to brain fondant, but were significant to the community. These villagers could change what it meant to be a “star” by connecting and sharing their recipes with the world.