The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) have launched a cinema advertisement campaign 'Feed Our Future' to raise awareness and take steps against hunger and malnutrition in India.
The campaign launch event included a panel discussion hosted by TV host Mini Mathur, which had actor-director Nandita Das and filmmakers Neeraj Ghaywan and Anubhav Sinha sharing their perspectives over cinema and social change.
"It is a very slow process as you are trying to change the mindset. Films don't create revolution but they do go into your subconscious. If cinema was powerful then films won't be banned. So the conservative and orthodox rather tell us that cinema is powerful and they are threatened by it.
"Also, cinema is a medium of communication and it can be used for all kinds of things. It can be used for information, for propoganda, it can be used to move people, but whatever a film tells you, it goes into your subconscious and very slowly impacts the way you respond to things," Nandita said during the discussion.
Neeraj said the commercial should be interesting enough to catch the attention of movie goers.
"We can get the narrative and aesthetic right. When you go to watch a film and a commercial of malnutrition plays people may not want to watch it because they have come with certain intent so there has to be aesthetic and narrative form in terms of creativity that should make me watch the commercial.
"It has to be powerful and you should feel for it. I feel that is essential to bring in audiences."
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