Leo Burnett London take the cool out of cocaine with two spots that tie in with the launch of Rachel Seifert’s film ‘Cocaine Unwrapped’

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Cocaine1.jpgCocaine2.jpgDartmouth films asked Leo Burnett London to help them take the cool out of cocaine with the UK audience who regard it as a rock and roll drug, snorted by celebrities and supermodels alike. Rachel Seifert’s film ‘Cocaine Unwrapped’ will be rolled out nationally to highlight the constant issues facing South America with this devastating industry that wrecks thousands of innocent lives.

The UK is the biggest consumer of cocaine in Europe. What harm is snorting a line or two when you’re having fun is a typical attitude of some people today.

Leo Burnett want to bring home to them the effect their habit has on people who are caught up in this destructive trade thousands of miles away. They wanted them to imagine how they’d feel if the terrible consequences surrounding the supplying of this drug were closer to home.

Under the theme of ‘You can’t ignore what’s under your nose’ two powerful pieces of film and one piece of sound design were produced to roll out nationally. The final line explains that for every line of cocaine taken in the UK, a life is taken in South America. The film will be part of the pre-roll to Cocaine Unwrapped.

Cocaine1a.jpgThe Machine.

From innocent farmers trying to make a living in Colombia, to the women forced into becoming drug mules to feed their families, to the innocent by-standers caught in the cross-fire of the warring cartels and militia, the machine eats up everyone and everything in it’s path. It’s an uncaring machine without a conscience or ethics. Its mechanical claws grab hold of all these human lives and drops them into its hopper. Everything is then pounded and mixed up with toxic chemicals and ground into white powder. The powder is then packaged into wraps and stamped on its assembly line. A hand grabs a wrap from the machine and it is sold on the streets of the UK to a woman. In a series of quick cuts the woman snorts the output of the machines productivity, her eyes widen she is filled with the tragedy of the human lives lost to supply her habit with a scream. A line appears saying ‘Snort a line of cocaine and you’re fuelling the machine’. A second line appears saying ‘You can’t ignore what’s under your nose’,  before we reprise the woman with a dribble of blood coming from her nose which she wipes away in disgust.

Cocaine2a.jpgRun for your life.

On a suburban British street, a large group of South American people are running with terror in their eyes. Inexplicably, they drop dead one after another on the street. The survivors, seeing their fellow runners dropping like flies, pick up their pace. They turn into a house and in through the door of a party. Another runner goes down in a heap his cap flying off his head as he falls. The people behind step over him and run up the stairs dodging past the fallen. One survivor reaches a bedroom door and pushes it open.. As he falls down dead we see a couple of party goers chopping a line of cocaine and snorting it. A super appears on screen explaining the mysterious deaths: For every line of cocaine snorted in the UK, a life is taken in South America. The end line appears ‘You can’t ignore what’s under your nose’ along with the website of the feature film ‘Cocaine Unwrapped’ that this film accompanies.