Movie 'Dombivli Return' Created a Strong Impact on Social Media with Great Content

Brand name

Dombivli Return

Agency Name

Heads or Tails

Objective

• Create buzz for the movie without any movie assets & also differentiate the movie from the award winning 2005 Marathi movie, ‘Dombivli Fast’, starring the same actor, Sandeep Kulkarni, in the main lead.
• Establish the core thought that the movie is a socio-psychological thriller of a common man.

Challenges

• Low budget
• No movie Assets Available for promotion as movie was still incomplete.

Strategy/Insight

We never wanted to take the usual route of contests. What we wanted to do is create original unique content and drive conversations around it. Since the objective was to differentiate the protagonist of the movie Dombivli Return from the protagonist of Dombivli Fast, we launched Anant Velankar, the main protagonist, on social media and had conversations going around him.

Execution

For the first time, the protagonist of the movie was launched on social media first before any major movie promotion. The character named Anant Velankar was first introduced as a basic common man on Facebook as well as on Twitter. The personality of the character was that of a common man who had to face the daily ordeals which commoners usually face. Someone who wants to change the system and makes an attempt to do it.  In the case of Anant Velankar, the character had the intonation of a helpless common man who was frustrated by circumstances.

Anant Velankar's Facebook page started with a series of corruption scandals being highlighted on a timeline basis. Major scandals right from the day of independence were highlighted. They went on to showcase how things in India have worsened over the years.

A set of 3 videos were launched and debates were held on several topics. The videos certainly reflected the plight of the common man and showed incidents where a common man's good deeds are met with fierce opposition from various elements in the society. The videos were released one by one and each video seemed to have a separate purpose and message.

The first video talked about how a eunuch saves a girl from being gang-raped and gets beaten up while trying to save her.

The video got 353 shares, 685 likes, 56 Comments & a Reach - 70,688 fans

The second video talked about a few college students who were trying to educate the children of prostitutes and how a cop beats them up for doing this noble task, stating that it is illegal. On Facebook, the video got a response of 254 shares, Likes – 518, Comments – 54, Reach – 61,280

This video also got shared by Storypick.com. It has a total of 11662 hits on youtube.com

The third video talked about how a young chap tried to help a blind man reach his destination and how he gets caught by the Railway police for travelling ticketless.

On Facebook, the video got 153 shares, Likes - 319 Comments – 27 Reach – 33,440 fans

All the videos highlighted how a common man has to struggle in doing anything good for the society and the challenges he faces. The video ended stating, ‘I am Anant Velankar, A common man’. They also highlighted facts about the  society and ended with #commonmancan asking fans to contribute their views.

In an attempt to popularize the character further, a tie up with Wearemumbai took place where Anant Velankar was made the curator. With a large number of followers on Wearemumbai , the character emphasized on common man related problems and roped the audience into various debates. Same 3 videos were also launched during the curation and debates were held on different topics related to common man.

Anant Velankar’s Twitter page also went about making conversations in the same hard hitting manner. Primarily, he was tweeting about the common man ordeal and his struggle against society evils.

Transition from Anant Velankar to Dombivli Return

The transition process from Anant Velankar to Dombivli Return had to be a very thought out process which needed to look very natural to the audience. On both the Anant Velankar and Dombivli return page a countdown was announced with the use of posts. The countdown was to create a mystery element and to arouse curiosity among the audience.

At the same time, promotions for the teaser countdown started on the Dombivli return page too.

Results

The entire build up helped the movie teaser video garner a total of 41K views with very low ad spend. Post the teaser launch, the Facebook and Twitter pages of Dombivli Return & Anant Velankar have been sharing the movie shoot.