Taika Waititi Goes to the Movies for Vue Cinemas

'Great characters follow you forever'

Vue, the European cinema chain, captures our obsession with make-believe in a campaign from Hijinks and director Taika Waititi.

The film below shows average folks shadowed by various film character types. It offers a great visual metaphor about the power of movies—and indeed, fiction of all kinds—to inform, distract and make a lasting impression on the masses.

While filming in London and Auckland, Waititi was “always watching for spontaneity, always ready to turn the unexpected into something memorable,” recalls Hijinks co-founder and co-CCO Marc Allenby.

“One standout behind-the-scenes moment came during the sequence featuring the knight running across the bridge. After around 20 takes in extreme Auckland heat, the actor, wearing a full suit of armor, began to give up. Taika immediately spotted the hilarity of the moment—and kept it in.”

Another challenge involved “designing fantasy-inspired characters that evoked iconic cinematic archetypes without directly replicating copyrighted figures,” he says. “It became about being creative within the parameters and capturing the essence of those characters. Eventually, it resulted in designs that felt ultimately more imaginative.”

“And I think that’s how these characters actually exist in every cinema-goer’s brain. They’re not precise, but impressions. And that made the final world feel even more original.”

By equal turns whimsical, surreal and a tad edgy, the approach feels especially truthful in conveying the deep bond between flesh-and-blood humans and folks on the screen. They “follow you forever,” the campaign says. As we face the constant grind of each uncertain day, many of us wouldn’t have it any other way.

“This is an epic love letter to cinema that reminds us why we go, and keeps us coming back,” Waititi says in press materials.

Breaking May 1, the work will initially roll out across the U.K. and Ireland with other European markers including the Netherlands, Germany and Italy close behind.