Posted on by Vishnu Devarajan
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McCann Worldgroup SEA & Dave Meyers bring whimsical brand film to life for Shangri-La
08 Jun
McCann Worldgroup Southeast Asia, together with GRAMMY award-winning film director, Dave Meyers, have been appointed to bring Shangri-La’s new visual film titled “Find Your Shangri-La” to life as part of Shangri-La’s new global brand campaign which launched on 15 May 2023.
The film kickstarts Shangri-La’s significant initiative to showcase the hotel brand’s ongoing efforts in inspiring guests to discover their own moments of joy. It also highlights the brand’s commitment to delivering unforgettable experiences through the authentic and the unexpected.
The launch is also seasonally aligned with the long-awaited resurgence of international travel markets.
To drive home the brand’s unique vision, the film is a remarkable departure from category norms. Instead of showcasing property amenities and lifestyle moments, “Find Your Shangri-La” employs whimsical metaphors, fantastical characters, and magical storytelling.
Leveraging on the film’s name which is also the campaign’s title, it highlights Shangri-La as not just a physical place, but as a state of mind associated with the joyful moments within the hotel experience.
The film centres around the journey of a peony flower, the protagonist, as it makes its way through the whimsical world of Shangri-La’s properties, searching for its own personal Shangri-La.
As it explores the world, the peony encounters various other ‘guests’, each enjoying their own whimsical versions of Shangri-La.
While these characters and their Shangri-La’s are fantastical, they were designed very strategically. Each subtly represents a different guest subset, such as foodies (the hummingbird), honeymooners (the wedding dress), wellness seekers (the penguins) or families with children (the train).
Brandon Cheung, Regional Director, Global Clients & Business Leadership, McCann Worldgroup Asia Pacific, says:
“We started with a beautiful truth about Shangri-La’s hospitality experience – Luxury is best expressed as personal moments of joy.
Shangri-La has delivered this at the heart of their service for over 50 years. This gave us tremendous creative license to push the imagination and create a magical, whimsical world with Shangri-La in film.”
To bring this ambitious project to life, multi-GRAMMY-award-winning film director Dave Meyers was commissioned alongside visual effects studio, The Mill (most recently of “Dumbo” and “The Lion King” fame), to shoot and create the magical vision of the new Shangri-La world.
The film launched worldwide on 15 May across all of Shangri-La’s social media channels and its official website.
The APPIES is an annual event that presents a rare opportunity for creative, media, digital and marketing agencies or brands to present their best campaigns to the industry.
This is the only event where Live Presentations meets Live Judging.
Similar to TED Talks, The APPIES is the chance for great presenters with outstanding work to show it off to some of the industry’s most important industry leaders.
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Campaign entries must have run between June 2024 to May 2025
