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.