Waiting List / Nowadays

2023-10-06
2m

Clever video taking viewers on a short, sharp shock of a journey through the state of UK medical transition services

Subtly smart, quietly surprising and deceptively simple, this piece illustrates how, across just 2 ½ minutes, online video can take viewers on a journey ending with their appreciation of real-world issues palpably increased.

Here, the issue is the UK’s poor resourcing of medical transition services for trans people. The film’s clever move is to focus our attention via what you might call a benign bait-and-switch. Lulling us into security by wearing the skin of an upbeat official health information film, it soon swiftly sheds that skin to reveal the downbeat reality – and reveal itself as a conscience-pricking NGO campaign video. All executed by cast and crew with admirable economy, skill and humanity.

Waiting List was made for trans-led charity Gendered Intelligence by content agency Nowadays, whose varied work exemplifies the online media-sphere’s mixed-genre economy, their slate embracing corporate promos, commercials and music video as well as NGO commissions.

Supportive of its cause, they produced Waiting List free of charge, but as things turned out it became an effective loss leader by winning awards – including the Cannes gong for best worldwide corporate film of its year – boosting the agency’s visibility in the ultra-competitive crowded field of commissioned comms films.

Waiting List is a dramatic narrative about Jenny, a young trans woman bravely taking the first steps in seeking gender affirming healthcare, only to be swallowed up by the system and see her future taken away.

Online Video

From viral memes to video essays, discover highlights from a new BFI National Archive collection...

First came the Cinema Age, then the TV Age, and now the age of Online Video. Digital film created for distribution online is today’s most dynamic, influential screen form. Encompassing much that’s new, from ASMR and Unboxing Videos to Twitch streaming and TikTok twerking, it’s also breathed new life into older film forms, filling our screens with fresh takes on advertising, journalism, satire, public information, campaigning, training and much else that’s been with us since time immemorial, and variously taking the forms of comedy, drama, documentary and animation. It’s become embedded into every aspect of UK (and world) society.

This unique collection of 50 online videos combines iconic highlights of British online video with other examples chosen to illustrate that sheer diversity. All were acquired by the BFI National Archive as part of the Lottery funded Our Screen Heritage programme. Our thanks to the Lottery, and lottery ticket buyers nationwide. for their support of this vital collecting and preservation work.