Background

Brief: We were challenged to bring the audience back in time to 1957, to reel them in to relive the moments when the Negaraku Choir came to life.

Describe the creative idea

In spirit of National day, our main objective was to tell an old patriotic tale of unity and harmony that not many Malaysians are aware of. We aimed to bring the audience on a journey back in time to one of the most historical moments, Malaysia's year of independence, 1957. In order to do so our task was to recreate that specific time setting, to bring to live the authentic vintage mood and feel. This would then allow for an immersive timeless storytelling experience through the musical narrative. To relive the era musically, most of our inspiration were derived from our local icon P Ramlee's songs. We wanted it to be as realistic while also staying true to our local history as possible. This then paves the way for our moral of the story while also bringing awareness of the forming of the national anthem.

Describe the strategy

We were tasked with the challenge of recreating a golden period of film for Malaysia. Intimate storying telling and being able to leave the viewer with a real sense of emotion and warmth was crucial.We decided that hints of the national anthem Negara Ku could be used in places to evoke feelings of patriotism and nostalgia. A local choir was used on the shoot so we thought to use some of that recording in the final track - this ended up being trickier than we thought as the edit would use different shots from different takes during the choir scene. Finding a number of singers and musicians who could pull off all the different genres within the film was always going to be interesting. Fortunately for us we have a fantastic selection of talented musicians in Malaysia. Apart from the preparation for various scenes the bulk of the work would

Describe the execution

First step was to record the live choir singing Negara Ku back in the studio. We needed to sync to picture later so had to be careful with tempo and performance during the choir scene.Once we received the edit we had the challenge of writing a cinematic score together with elements of “period” music set during the time of the film - 1957. A P Ramlee type track was written for a number of scenes. The sound and song needed to feel as if it was written during that time. Lyics for the P.Ramlee moment were provided courtesy of a 2am producer’s elderly parents!The final 2 minutes of the film needed a delicate score to pull at heart strings so it was fun to use strains of Negaraku in the melody while at the same time making it a more modern film score. Finishing off with a lighter moment we

Describe the outcome

In the end the effect of film and audio produced one of the most loved Merdeka commercials for 2019 with over 3.4 million views and endless positive heartfelt comments from fellow Malaysians. The film also won Gold for Film Direction and Bronze for Music in Film Content, in the recent Kancil Awards. A beautiful story and great way to bring people together through the universal power of music!