Academy Award-winning filmmaker Taika Waititi has created a steamy short film for the Breast Cancer Foundation NZ’s latest awareness campaign.
The film’s launch coincides with the start of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, which runs throughout October.
The foundation’s goal is to ensure women make checking their breasts part of an existing routine. Waititi’s film, ‘Save your life – rinse & repeat’, says the shower is the perfect place. It features actor Xavier Garneau-Roughan, who rubs his pectorals while urging women to also cop a feel while they shower.
The charity’s previous campaign, ‘Normal for me’, made in partnership with Ogilvy in 2024, encouraged Kiwis to become familiar with the normal look and feel of their breasts.
‘Save your life – rinse & repeat’, created via Special Group, now aims to change behaviour by making regular breast checks impossible to forget.
Rinse and repeat
New research commissioned by Breast Cancer Foundation NZ found that while almost all New Zealand women surveyed aged 20 to 44 (94%) agree regular breast checking is important, 82% say it is easy to forget. Only 37% had checked their breasts within the previous month, while one in eight said they had never checked for changes.
Breast Cancer Foundation NZ CEO Vanessa Sorenson says: “Our goal is zero deaths from breast cancer and finding breast cancer earlier is critical to achieving it because it gives women the best chance of successful treatment and survival. Women know checking matters, but knowing is not the same as doing. When more than eight in ten women tell us it is easy to forget, we need to find new ways to make the message stick.”
For Waititi, the creative response was simple: make breast self-checking something women are unlikely to forget.
The idea also builds on an existing behaviour. More than half of women surveyed who had checked their breasts said the shower was where they last did it. Yet nearly seven in 10 said nothing in their normal routine currently reminds them to check.
“Breast cancer has affected many people in my life, including my mother and mother-in-law, so my involvement in this project was never in question. We set out to create something entertaining that also carries an important message – check your breasts,” says Waititi.
Unforgettable message
Sorenson adds: “Taika has an extraordinary ability to take a serious subject and make people stop, watch and talk about it, and that is exactly what we needed here. The shower gives us a moment that already exists in everyday life, and Taika has turned it into something memorable enough to prompt women to check.”
‘Save your life – rinse & repeat’ launches today, using humour, (shower) steam and entertainment to turn an important health message into something much harder to forget.
The post Taika Waititi creates steamy ad for Breast Cancer Foundation NZ appeared first on stoppress.co.nz.
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