Peter Thompson, a film-maker and one of our associates has contributed this blog based on a project he worked on recently for a small London-based business that champions the making of real bread. The business is called Virtuous Bread, and as the name suggests it’s about more than just flour, water yeast and salt. It’s almost a campaign, aiming to revitalize the making and sharing of bread, an act that can bring people, families and communities together. We were asked to make a short film about the founder, and to shed some light on the motivation and principles behind the business.
And this is where story comes in. In every project we work on we try to see the story, to unpick some of the assumptions about the role of film and video and create something that will engage and hopefully last in the memory. Of course, occasionally we need to communicate facts, or to demonstrate some whizzy features of this product or that service, but ultimately it always comes down to story and emotion – and that means people.
People say that they do business with people they like – which sounds about right to me – but if we only have a fleeting moment, and are “meeting” people through the screen of some kind of device, how can we best make contact? Well, just as with Jane, the founder of Virtuous Bread, for us it’s about showing more than just the scripted story, or the company line, and showing the vulnerability, the spontaneity the warmth of the people. It may be stating the obvious, but without the people, real people with their authentic quirks and vulnerability, the story becomes thin and manufactured. The best way to explain it is to suggest that you watch the film.
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Narrative Leadership Associates 