"Yoo-hoo, Smugglers! Might we discuss this parcel with you?"
London’s Raindance Film
Festival received a bit of a shock when they received a package from Smuggler’s
Inn containing hundreds of .45 caliber bullets.
(Thanks, Fed-Ex, now we know who will ship all the these surplus hand
grenades we’ve been selling on e-Bay.)
To be fair, the brass
cartridges we sent to Raindance were loaded not with lead and powder, but
messages which began, “You’re fingerprints have turned up on a piece of
evidence in a criminal investigation.”
Further reading asked you to report to the Raindance film festival for
questioning, where you may also buy tickets “for a good crime drama or
shoot-em-up.” The bullets were just one
of several no-budget/high PR gags we did to promote the various offerings at
the 20th incarnation of London’s bravest independent film festival. Other ideas included tricking passers-by into
touching a poster that had supposedly been sprayed with poison and posting
festival flyers sideways at ground-level on pub walls and in gutters so
London’s notoriously hard-drinking young people could more easily read them.
Yes, if you’re a paying
customer, Smug’s can promise you an effective campaign that you’ll be
comfortable with, but if you’re a film festival, free clinic or similar, you
may have to trust us that whatever we give you is going to work.
