du Bring Bad Cinema Experiences to Life

Leo Burnett Dubai have released the latest in their award-winning series for UAE telecoms.

In Man Sitting Next to You, directed by Ali Ali and Maged Nassar of Good People, the agency take a new approach to the brand's du Tuesday scheme, in which users of the network can get two-for-one tickets to the cinema on Tuesdays.

Whereas previous ads have focused on the films, this new ad is all about the cinema experience, and how it can be ruined if the wrong person sits next to you - the implication being that with du you can control who you sit next to by bringing a friend for free.

Shot beautifully, with bright colours, close-ups and stylised cutaways of nacho cheese bubbling and popcorn exploding, the ad shows nightmare cinema neighbours eating loudly, farting and sneezing among many other cinema code violations.

Man Sitting Next to You is the next in a long line of ads from the same creative team-brand partnership, all of which have received major awards such at Dubai Lynx and Cannes Lions - in fact, the first iteration of the campaign won the first ever Gold Lion for the UAE.

The first of these campaigns saw Leo Burnett making clips from fake movies that needed to be seen with a friend because they were Too Boring/Distressing/Insulting/Informative/Complicated(...) to be seen alone. These were then followed with more awards for a series of fake press junket interviews where directors talked about films too long/sad/confusing. Presumably, this series, the most internationally awarded in MENA history, had to end because Leo Burnett and Good People just ran out of adjectives. 

See more great work from Dubai with our guide to some of the best work to win at Dubai Lynx