Poking fun at a kid with serious vision problems hardly seems like a winning creative proposition. But this exaggerated depiction of a boy who has trouble seeing actually plays well, calling attention with a smile to the many cases in which detecting impaired sight isn’t always so easy.
We open on a lad attempting to pour milk into his bowl of cereal. However, most of the cow juice lands on the table.
Next, he’s at the base of a tree looking up and saying, “Here kitty,” to help get down what we presume is a cat stranded on a high branch. The camera reveals, though, that the animal is instead a squirrel.
Our young protagonist is then seen riding his scooter–smack dab into the side of a bus kiosk.
We then see him playing basketball. Unfortunately, he shoots the ball not toward the hoop but rather a fence, hitting another kid on the head.
This is followed by a bathroom break. Alas, he walks into the girl’s restroom. A moment later, we see him thrown out of there, landing on his rump.
Finally, he’s carrying two slushy drinks to a car; his mom is behind the wheel. But he doesn’t see that the passenger side window is all the way up. The two drinks smash into the glass, leaving a frosty fruity glaze on the window.
Through all these episodes, a voiceover provides some perspective that takes the scenes from slapstick to relevance. “You think it would be easy to tell which kids have trouble with their eyesight,” says the voiceover. However, that’s not always the cases, he continues. The voiceover goes on to point out that one of four children may have a vision problem and that eye doctors note that the symptoms aren’t always so obvious.
Furthermore, 80 percent of all childhood learning is visual. Without good vision, kids can have difficulty learning to read and could fall behind in school.
For clues regarding the real-life signs of childhood vision problems and to find out what parents can do, the voiceover recommends logging onto CheckYearly.com, a Web site backed by the Vision Council of America, and the Reading Is Fundamental organization.
Matthew Pittroff of Working Stiff Commercial Film Production, Baltimore, directed and executive produced “Here Kitty” for agency August, Lang and Husak, Bethesda, MD.
Kurt Uebersax produced for Working Stiff. The DP on the PSA was Alain Betrancourt.
Chuck Husak was the agency creative director, and jack-of-all-trades, also handling art direction and copywriting duties. He worked with freelance copywriter Francis Sullivan.
Editor was George Kelly of GK Edit, Richmond, Va. Kirk Davis of Producers Video, Baltimore, was the online editor. Micah Kirz of Moving Images, New York, was the colorist. Audio mixer was Mike Brilhart of Producers Video.
Steve Palmieri of Producers Video was the 2-D animation artist. Sound designer was Ned Boyle, also of Producers Video.
