2020/2021 Winners & Shortlists

Write a short summary of what happens in the film

Our film revolves around a common occurrence in Saudi Arabia: mispronouncing English words because they contain letters that don’t have Arabic equivalents, and the funny disagreements people have over the correct pronunciation. Our film shows two friends at a Burger King drive-thru getting into a heated argument about the correct pronunciation of “Burger”. The debate they have is funny and dramatic because they reflect actual conversations Saudis have about this topic. The friends then transform into Arabic professors who take the argument into the next level with humorous claims related to the Arabic language. After the sense of chaos left after every character has said their piece, Burger King’s drive-thru operator settles the dispute by saying: “It’s called “Whopper!! And your taste buds will know the difference”. Moral of the story: it doesn’t matter how you say “burger”, as long as you know enjoy the undisputed whopper.

Cultural / Context information for the jury

In Arabic, the letter “G” with its phonetic sound “geh” doesn’t even exist in the Arabic alphabet, so it’s very common in Arabic speaking countries like Saudi Arabia to pronounce words that contain the letter “G” in different questionable ways. For example, “burger” would be pronounced as “burjer”, “burker” or “burgher”. As a result, multiple variations have existed for one English word that has a letter that can’t be pronounced in Arabic. This is an issue that international brands have always faced when they operate in Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia. It’s very common for Arabic speakers to mispronounce a brand name; it might be unfortunate for the brand but luckily for consumers, it often leads to humorous exchanges among people and sometimes, heated conversations.