Procedures

Following an extended absence after the death of someone close to me (don't worry, it was pneumonia, not passive smoking or a drinking driver) I'm back and I'm trying to get an appointment with Film Images for next week, so suggestions still welcome. Meanwhile, thanks to the lovely Applemask, I've discovered YouTube user wuzzlevideos, who has an arseload of old road safety PIFs and I'll be profiling some of them here.

So, if the mid - '90s anti speeding films Don't Look Now and Funeral Blues (http://takingthepif.blogspot.com/2007/04/funeral-bluesdont-look-now.html) weren't enough to convince Britain's boy racers to hit the brakes, this 1997 follow up should have ensured the message was received. With thanks to the aforementioned wuzzlevideos, you can see it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOnF8citByU. The Think! website says of the campaign:

'Procedures'
£3.5m TV and radio campaign - September/October 1997

Creative treatment

Continuing the home video theme, a 60s commercial uses new footage of children who were subsequently killed by speeding motorists in urban areas. A voice-over explains some of the procedures police officers should follow when breaking news of a death to the family of a road accident victim. Advertising carried the endline 'So please let's all slow down' 'Kill your speed'. Three 10s silent versions show a still image of a child followed by the captions. Family members again talk about the loss of their child in radio commercials and ask drivers to slow down.

And if you were thinking of joining the old bill but road fatalities aren't your area of expertise, here's how the pros do it:

"All officers delivering the message must appreciate the implications of their task. News of the death should be broken with compassion and tact by the officer, without the use of jargon. Great care must be taken in the use of language; for the families, the word 'accident' is in many cases totally inappropriate. Property should not be returned in a distasteful condition, and consideration should be given to having it professionally cleaned. Given the often appalling injuries sustained by the victims, officers may choose to advise family members not to view the body. However, the long term importance of saying 'goodbye' is well documented."

Again, we've got the endline "So please, let's all slow down" and the "Kill your speed" hand logo.

Look out for review of full - length The Finishing Line up next, probably tonight but might be tomorrow.

Funeral Blues/Don't Look Now

Found on YouTube courtesy of a user called Applemask, who has some great PIFs in his collection. (Edit: He's definitely male, and has made a guest appearance on this site. Thank you, Applemask!) Both of these are 1990s PIFs about speeding, and they're profiled on the Think! website.

"Funeral Blues" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPnjeVHYQBM&mode=related&search) shows video footage of children who were later killed by speeding drivers in residential areas, with a soundtrack of John Hannah reading WH Auden's poem of the same name as featured in Four Weddings and a Funeral. As Applemask says, the PIF is genuinely harrowing, and horribly sad when you think that those children never grew up. I remember that the mother of one of the children featured in this PIF was interviewed on the BBC programme 999, but not what she said. Here's what the Think! website says about "Funeral Blues":

'Funeral Blues'
£2m TV and radio campaign - May 1996
£0.75m TV, radio and cinema
campaign - Sept 1996

Creative treatment
Three television commercials (one 90s, two 40s) featuring home video footage of young children who were later knocked down and killed in residential areas. Poetry readings about loss and grief (including the reading of W H Auden's poem from the film 'Four Weddings and a Funeral') reinforce the emotive nature of the video footage. In six radio commercials family members of the victims talk about the loss they have experienced and appeal directly to motorists to check their speed. Advertising carried the endline 'At times we all drive a bit too fast' 'Kill Your Speed'. The Kill your speed 'hand symbol' was designed and used for the first time on the television advertisements and publicity literature

Advertising objective
Show drivers that it could happen to them. The cynicism with which some drivers regard 'unreal' advertising must be suspended because it really did happen to these children and the drivers involved. Convince all drivers that going 'a little too fast' is unacceptable. Force them to recognise the seriousness of speeding in urban areas and their personal responsibility not to drive too fast. Encourage drivers to think about the long-term implications of road traffic accidents. Use of radio to reach drivers in their cars.

If I can find the other two PIFs from this campaign, I will. I didn't know that was the first use of the "Kill your speed" hand logo, but I agree with Applemask that it's a fabulous piece of animation. "Funeral Blues" was later followed by "Procedures", which also showed video footage of children killed by speeding drivers, but this time with a voiceover of a man solemnly reciting the official guidelines for when a police officer has to break the news to a victim's family after a gruesome road death. Another one for me to try and get hold of.

"Don't Look Now" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ex5nppYgjYk&mode=related&search) is a year older, from 1995. A little girl is merrily frolicking in the school playground but, she informs the viewer, YOU are going to kill her! Why? You'll kill her because you overslept, you'll kill her "for an appointment", and without even thinking about it. At the very end we see her as a driver sees her from their car - right before running her over. But she ends on the more positive note "You're going to kill me UNLESS YOU KILL YOUR SPEED", and we'd rather do that instead, wouldn't we? This one still has the "Safety on the Move" logo at the end, so I would assume its use ended in 1995 or early 1996 (and was partially replaced by the "Kill Your Speed" hand sign.) However, the YouTube video is probably a short version: I seem to remember that the original was longer than that. Which is probably why she'll be killed by a driver who overslept AFTER she's been to school. Funny that.

And the review from the Think! site:

'Don't Look Now'
£1.4m TV campaign, May 1995
£1.1m TV, radio and press, Sept 1995
£220,000 radio campaign, Feb 1996

The black and white television commercial portrays a young schoolgirl at home and on her way to school. A child's voice-over tells drivers 'You're going to kill me...' followed by trivial excuses people give for driving too fast... '...because you're late for a meeting/to keep up with the traffic'. In the last frame she is seen through a windscreen by a driver who cannot stop in time. National press advertisements and radio commercials featuring children's voices reinforce the excuses theme. Radio was used successfully for the first time to bring the message to drivers in their cars.

Elephant/Julie

I'm currently preparing a big post on Jo and Petunia, but I wanted to make some stills from my copy of the Charley Says DVD. I hope that's legal, or at least more legal than pinching someone else's pictures from another site. I will not make every post about road safety PIFs, but these two have articles on Wikipedia and I remember them very well.

"Elephant" was an innovative campaign that ran between 1993 and 1998, when it was replaced by "Julie". It was reposted at the Think! website in honour of the 20th anniversary of the ongoing national seat belts initiative, and you can see it here: http://www.thinkroadsafety.gov.uk/campaigns/seatbelts/download/19archive.mpg

(We open with four people driving along in an ordinary car, country 'n' western music playing on the radio. It's shot in black and white, and there's something that's not quite right about the scene, but all seems well as they are laughing and chattering away)

VO: In a crash at 30 miles per hour

(A lorry honks at them, and the driver desperately swerves to avoid it)

an adult back seat passenger without a seat belt

(Too late! They're crashing!)

is thrown forward at the force of 3 and a half tons*. The weight of an elephant

(The unrestrained man sitting behind the driver is thrown forward into the seat in front, and we see him morphing into an elephant in slow motion)

charging straight through the driver.

(The driver's seat lurches forward with the passenger's weight. The car horn sounds as his head smashes into the steering wheel, then he goes through the windscreen and out onto the bonnet, held in place by his seat belt. Close up as blood drips through his fingers)

You're NEVER safe in the back

(The front seat passenger stares in shock)

until you fasten your seat belt. Never forget -

(Background of the side of the car, with a splash of red paint on the road beside it, and broken glass all around. The words "NEVER FORGET" appear on screen, along with the "Safety on the Move" logo. We hear the "clunk" of a car door closing and the "click" of a seatbelt fastening as the words "Clunk Click" come up)

* I'm going to assume that's an imperial ton. We hadn't gone metric yet in 1993.

According to Wikipedia, this was the last seatbelts PIF to use any variant of the "Clunk Click" line, and I can't remember any since. I will, at some point, do another post on Jimmy Savile's famous "Clunk Click Every Trip" campaign.

In 1998, the "Julie" PIF took over, available for viewing here: http://www.thinkroadsafety.gov.uk/campaigns/seatbelts/download/20archive.mpg. In this one, a woman is driving her two teenage offspring to school but, we are warned, "Julie knew her killer". It's not going to be pretty. She seems paranoid about trying to avoid a van behind her, and is more concerned about constantly checking the rear view mirror than looking at the road ahead. Can you guess what happens next, boys and girls? That's right! She crashes into a parked car and although her seat belt stops her going forward, it's no protection from her son, who is sitting behind her without one and smashes into her. Watch that skull fracture in all directions! We finish with Julie's daughter screaming in terror as the young boy flops back into his seat ("after crushing her to death, he sat back down") and Julie's body remains motionless in the driver's seat, with blood everywhere. Midsomer Murders this is not, but it's still a scary PIF.

The original version, as you can see, had the endline "Belt up in the back. For everyone's sake" but it was later amended to show the Think! logo on a black screen, with the words "Think! Always wear a seat belt". According to Wikipedia, "Julie" was repeated overseas in France; and in 2004 (I think) it was replaced by the current and rather uninteresting "Rewind".

So there you have it, folks. Wear your seat belt, or you might turn into an elephant and kill your mother. Or something.