Cannes Lions

MUMBAI MIRROR

TAPROOT INDIA, Mumbai / BENETT & COLEMAN / 2015

Awards:

1 Bronze Cannes Lions
2 Shortlisted Cannes Lions
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Film
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Overview

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Credits

Overview

Description

Hated. Not Ignored.

A film that celebrates the victory of truth and embraces the hatred that comes with it, almost with gratitude. Watch the stories of Mumbai and prepare to be moved by the hard hitting reality of the city that never sleeps.

Execution

The film begins by showing apparent victims pleading for justice from what seems like blatant victimization. They seems so much like victims that one starts out feeling sorry for them being disciplined, exposed even harassed, it seems.

Until it begins to dawn that what they are justifying is the very epitome of evil itself. Villains who have been exposed for who they are by stories done in the Mumbai Mirror. They are so far gone in their evil deeds that they are actually passing it of as good and necessary. So cold-blooded are they in their belief that it seems like they cannot see any wrong in what they are doing.

And when they end up hating the Mumbai Mirrror with all their soul, it is with a sense of shock and relief that one realizes how much it takes to make ‘this’ side of society to hate one.

We intercut between the following stories:

1.

SLEAZY, STREET MOLESTERS OF WOMEN. THE KIND WHO LURKS AROUND IN DARK ALLEYS AND CROWDED PLACES SEEKING TO FULLFILL THEIR EVIL LUSTFUL DESIRES. ONE OF THEM HAS A BLACK EYE AND LOOKS SCARED, FURTIVE, LIKE HAUNTED ANIMALS.

Look at this? See how they’ve hit me?

Beat me up like a dog…

Is this done?

What can I say, it happens sometimes, and we can't control ourselves, you see.

Sometimes when you see a woman, one's hand can touch someone here or there.

So what!?

What's the big deal?

Why make an issue out of it.

Just a bit of molestation, that’s it... I haven't RAPED anyone have I?

But these a*****s have to print this news in the paper!

M*******s!

2.

A WOMAN WHO LIVES OFF THE EXPLOITATION OF OTHER WOMEN, PUSHING MINORS INTO SEXUAL SLAVERY TO SATISFY HER OWN ENDS:

I’ve raised them like my own daughters.

Look at this poor thing.

Business... This is a business we run!

But these newspaper guys can’t stand it.

Commodities are commodities after all, whether they come packed in a box or a dress.

How does it matter if they’re just 14-15 year olds?

She’s just a girl, not Mother India!

Agreed we have to use force to start with and it's tough on the girls too...

But eventually they all accept it, don't they?

Curse you! You’ll pay for this! M********s!

3.

FLY-BY NIGHT, SEEDY MEMBER OF THE MEDICAL PROFESSION WHO SATISFIES HIS LUST FOR WEALTH BY BREAKING EVERY LINE OF THE HIPPOCRATIC OATH AND EXPLOITS THE WEAKER SECTIONS OF SOCIETY FOR THE ILLEGAL ORGAN TRANSPLANT TRADE:

Sir… times have changed.

Nowadays it's a sin to even save a life...

What's my fault?

Just that I am a dealer in human livers and kidneys?

God has given us two kidneys anyway and one is a spare!

If I transfer the spare to someone else why does it hurt your journalists?

Yes…so we charge money too... But it’s like a distribution business

Why get into legal - illegal here?

This bloody newspaper has destroyed my business!

4.

CORRUPT CIVIL CONTRACTOR WHO WAS IN THE NEWS FOR THE LARGE NUMBER OF RAILWAY ACCIDENTS DUE TO GROSS NEGLIGENCE:

I just took a contract and this is how they hound me?!

I really don’t understand!

And now they say, ‘Raise the height of the entire platform!’

Who's the loser? Me. Who else?

It's such a small gap... Can’t you jump this much?

Yeah, sometimes while boarding or alighting someone may lose an arm or a foot.

So what? I deeply apologize for that!

We come to a dramatic high in the film, as we see each of these shameless perpetrators spew venom against the Mumbai Mirror.

And we cut to a shot of the molesters being chased by the police.

We then cut to a montage of the victims as they say: I am Mumbai.

We cut to the Pimp/ Madam as she’s being put in a police van and she says:

What Mumbai? Mumbai?

I am not Mumbai!

And she spits with spite.

The police van drives out of frame to the sound of wailing sirens.

We cut to a shot of a burning Mumbai Mirror.

SUPER appears: Hated by some. Thankfully.

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TAPROOT DENTSU, Mumbai

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2016, BENETT & COLEMAN

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