Embrace Life
| Embrace Life | |
|---|---|
The father and daughter.
|
|
| Directed by | Daniel Cox |
| Written by | Daniel Cox |
| Starring | Austin Spangler Lara Corrochano Clare Denning |
| Distributed by | Sussex Safer Roads Partnership |
|
Release date
|
|
|
Running time
|
1 minute 29 seconds |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Budget | £47,000 |
Embrace Life is a short British public information film made for the Sussex Safer Roads Partnership (SSRP) about the importance of wearing seat belts. Released on 20 January 2010 and initially only shown in the local Sussex area, the short film became an international phenomenon after it was distributed on the internet, through social networking sites and YouTube, gaining over a million views in its first two weeks. By 13 February 2010 it had reached 129 different countries, was the 5th top rated video that month on YouTube and was the most top rated YouTube film of all time in the education category. The film achieved the highest rating of No. 8 Top Rated (All Time) film on YouTube, and as of 27 March 2013 it has had over 16,599,000 views. The film has been praised for its beauty and its emotional impact. The film has so far not been shown on television as part of a road safety campaign; although that was for which it was primarily designed and its spread has been almost entirely through the internet.
Despite being a legal requirement for all car drivers and passengers in the UK, some people fail to wear their seat belt. The Sussex Safer Roads Partnership is a local government body in the East Sussex and West Sussex areas of England, and was looking to produce an internet-based road safety campaign film with a positive message, rather than one using more graphic shock tactics. Double BAFTA award-winning writer and director Daniel Cox learned of the proposed campaign, and approached the Partnership with an idea for just such a film:
"Key to the film's creation was to focus on a message that didn't take a conventional route to shock and scare the audience; rather it was my intention to bring the audience in on the conversation of road safety, specifically seat belts, and the best way to do this was to make a film that could engage the viewer purely visually and could be seen and understood by all, whoever they are and wherever they lived." (Daniel Cox)
The name of the film, Embrace Life, reflects its focus on life rather than the death and injury often associated with car crashes. Producer Sarah Alexander joined the project and immediately was faced with the challenge of the logistics of bringing Cox's vision to fruition. He specifically wanted slow-motion photography, requiring state of the art camera technology and 93,000 watts of lighting required by the high-speed filming.
...
Wikipedia