Sudden Impact: How Stories Are Changing Our World For Good.
You may have never heard of the term ‘Social Impact Entertainment’ - but we guarantee you’ve seen some. We break down what it means, and examine the power that social impact entertainment can wield.
good.film
3 years ago
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Impact. It’s a forceful word, no? It almost has an onomatopoeic quality - like ‘bang’ or ‘slap’. It implies you’ve been hit with something that you won’t forget in a hurry. Now in the case of a boxing glove or a wild stampede, say, that’s pretty bad news. But as DeNiro uttered to Pacino in the infamous cafe scene from Heat: there’s a flipside to that coin. Impact can be good! In fact - impact can do good.
Studies have shown that we humans only change our behaviour if we feel an emotion that prompts that change. We can be told, shown or guided, and it might nudge us, for a while. But if we feel a core emotion - thrilled, shocked, revolted, disturbed, overjoyed, incensed or any of a thousand other reactions that we’re instinctively wired with - these feelings actually spur us into action. It’s something that Greenpeace Philippines harnessed in 2020 with a giant art installation they commissioned - of a beached whale constructed entirely from ocean plastic. We all know plastic is bad for marine life, but actually seeing it like this? It’s a gut punch. One that spurred over 20,000 locals to sign an ASEAN petition urging them to take concrete measures against plastics pollution in the high seas.
That’s emotion-led action in the real world, but what about on our screens? Enter social impact entertainment - stories that make powerful, positive change in the world. It makes sense: from the dawn of time, humans have been wired for stories, and for centuries storytelling was how we transferred our history, our knowledge and of course, entertained one another. There’s an actual chemical basis to what’s going on: researcher Paul Zak took to the lab to study oxytocin, a fabulous hormone that acts as a chemical messenger in our brains and proved that “when the brain synthesizes oxytocin, people are more trustworthy, generous, charitable, and compassionate.” And what’s the hormone that floods our bodies when we’re transported to another world by characters and stories that move us? You guessed it - oxytocin. So you can imagine how stories that make us feel - anything from powerful documentaries to a wrenching drama, or even a fluffy but focused reality show - can get us thinking, moving and acting on causes we’re passionate about.
“As the world becomes more fractured and perilous, it’s up to content creators to tell the stories that move us forward as a species on our sacred planet.”
Rainn Wilson, Creating Soulful Content
As it turns out, a lot of us are already binge-watching with the world around us in mind. Nearly half of all streaming subscribers are made up of Gen Z viewers and their slightly older, but equally socially-minded Millennial counterparts. In the US, a recent report by Cone Communications found that a staggering 94% of Gen Z media consumers believe companies should proactively address environmental and social issues - while 89% said they would rather align with a company that supports these issues than one that does not. With numbers like those, it’s no wonder Hollywood has taken notice, realising that social impact entertainment can also return a seriously impressive bottom line.
Social Impact Entertainment in Action
Regardless of whether you use the term “social justice” as a proud battle cry or woke online insult, there’s no question that in innumerable ways, society as a whole is being prompted to revisit what it holds true and fair. But it’s been a long, long road to get here. We’ve already seen many societal shifts, triggered in part by some magnificent examples of social impact entertainment.
From the now immortalised episode of Mr Rogers’ Neighbourhood in which Mr Rogers and Officer Clemmons cool their feet together in a paddling pool (during an era - the 1960s - when public swimming pools were still segregated) to the inclusion of Noor and Aziz, the first refugee muppets on Sesame Street, stories help us discover our common humanity. Consider Will & Grace, the first sitcom in US history to star recurring lead characters who were gay: it’s commonly cited as the leading influence in not only a string of future shows celebrating LGBTQI characters, but for general acceptance to finally and broadly take place. Even future President Joe Biden spoke out, saying: “"I think Will & Grace did more to educate the American public [about gay rights] than almost anything anybody has ever done.” It underlines the point - we can only decide to make positive social change if we’re exposed to an issue in the first place.
For a more specific example, let’s go ring shopping. If you’ve ever looked into buying a diamond, you’ll be well versed on the “four C’s” - but since the release of Blood Diamond in 2006, you’re probably taking a further step in your research.
The Kimberley Process - which certifies that diamonds are conflict free - was instituted in 2003, however most people had probably never heard of a ‘conflict diamond’ until Leonardo DiCaprio’s film, nominated for 5 Oscars, brought it to our attention. Chalk that one up as a win to director Ed Zwick, who’s on record as stating that one of the goals of his film was to highlight the responsibility consumers have to reckon with the implications of the origins of their purchases.
“As a filmmaker, I want to entertain people first and foremost. If out of that comes a greater awareness and understanding, then the hope is that change can happen.”
Ed Zwick
If you can think of a cause, you can probably think of a piece of social impact entertainment that’s shone a light on it from at least one angle - and they don’t necessarily need to be 5000W spotlights. While the outcomes of a filmmakers’ desire can be clear and urgent - such as Blackfish advocating for the banning of orca whale shows - they can also be more idealistic. Bridgerton creator Chris Van Dusen says he was inspired by “one possible fact about Queen Charlotte – she was England’s first Queen of mixed race” when he crafted the series, a suggestion leading audiences to potentially rethink how they fantasise about romance.
Another string to the bow of social impact entertainment is to highlight a single facet of a well-known issue: like Dallas Buyer’s Club did in exposing the FDA’s convoluted and discriminatory approval process for HIV medications. SIE can also re-humanize an issue that audiences may have become desensitized to - for example Milk, which chronicled the life and untimely death of Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man elected to a public office in California. Incidentally, both films won acting Oscars for their leading men - lending further welcome attention to these worthy causes.
“When you can make audiences empathise with something they initially felt wasn’t relatable? That’s the first step toward change.”
Don Cheadle, The Power Within
With causes from animal welfare and gun control to the AIDS crisis and our wider public health & wellbeing all benefiting from Hollywood’s lens, SIE has made huge inroads over the decades. Here are a few more notable mentions:
Bambi prompts hunters to put down their guns.
Okay, we’re not naive enough to think that deer hunters gave up shooting all animals for good. But surprisingly, the Disney film Bambi (1942), in which a mother deer is killed in front of her baby, caused deer hunting in the US to drop by half.
Quite a seismic shift - and a great demonstration of how a story that creates empathy can affect change.
Philadelphia opens minds and hearts.
Philadelphia (1993) was the first major Hollywood film to address the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The film dealt sensitively with topics of homosexuality and homophobia, directed at a general public largely ignorant - or worse, fearful - of the disease.
Philadelphia made a huge difference in turning the tide of public opinion, helping to de-stigmatise AIDS at a time when it was urgently overdue. Oh, and in what we’ve noticed is a recurring theme, the film picked up yet another lead acting Oscar - for movies’ Mr Nice Guy, Tom Hanks.
Super Size Me takes extra calories off the menu.
The noughties brought us a rich vein of accessible and conversation-spurring documentaries, with Bowling For Columbine (2002), An Inconvenient Truth (2006), and Super Size Me (2004) all getting the general population ruminating on uncomfortable topics.
While the former two won Academy Awards, the latter quite literally hit closest to our hearts, demonstrating what happens to the human body when it consumes nothing but fast-food for a month. Spoiler alert: nothing good, and the public voted with their wallets. Less than two months after the film’s premiere, McDonald’s removed its “super-size” option from restaurants across the United States. Despite claims that the events weren’t linked, we reckon Ronald’s big old clown pants were well & truly on fire with that one.
Don’t Look Up lifts a mirror to climate apathy.
Toilet paper shortages aside, climate change has progressively been considered the greatest threat to humanity in recent years. Yet despite the pleading of scientists and climate experts - and the giant wake-up call delivered by Al Gore in the aforementioned An Inconvenient Truth - we’re still staring down the barrel of irreversible (and potentially catastrophic) changes to the little blue rock we call home.
Enter Adam McKay - yes, the same guy who directed Anchorman - with a megastar cast virtually guaranteed to grab our attention… and with any luck, our action. Don’t Look Up (2021) reflected the climate crisis back to us with an “if you don’t laugh, you’ll cry” approach that ultimately proved incredibly effective, landing the biggest week of cumulative views in Netflix history. While it’s a mite too early yet to attribute direct action to the film, that’s a LOT of eyeballs, and they’re all connected to brains... unless you count the ones belonging to the inept government portrayed in the movie.
“Make sure your audience understands the steps they can take in their own lives to be part of the change you are seeking to create.”
Leonardo DiCaprio, A Wave of Change
It’s important to remember that, while large impacts can be easier to see - like our Blackfish example, where a straight line of causation can be drawn between entertainment and action - there are micro-impact moments happening on every tv screen, every day. From the choice of wording used to refer to a minority group in a reality show, to the way characters on your favourite sitcom react to a given situation - our brains are constantly processing these inputs, whether we realise it or not.
When you weigh it all up, we give entertainment incredible access to our thoughts and minds, particularly if you’re in the mega-streaming generations of Millennials and Zs. But we here at Goods prefer to believe that this is more blessing than curse. When you consider the remarkable force that stories have on our emotions, the growing potential of social impact entertainment to create lasting positive change might just become the best story ever told.
Curious about more examples of social impact entertainment? We’ve got you. Sign up at good.film to find inspirational movies and TV exploring a variety of causes. Tag movies and TV with causes you care about. Create watchlists and share with friends to keep the conversation going. Help make change where you feel it matters most - and inspire others to do more good!
