The art of moving people and missions forward

Five lessons from the communication frontline.

Information in the form of billions of messages are competing for our attention every day. With the torrent of information unfailingly delivered to our mobile phones, much of it dominated by conservative and right-wing ideologues, the loudest voices we hear are frequently the furthest away from the truth. Clearly, searching for and broadcasting truthful information implies strategically cutting through the digital noise that requires new ways of thinking and doing communications. The survival of the liberal democratic project in the 21^st century hinges on fact-based yet emotionally gripping communication. 

As documentary filmmakers, we believe we have an important role to play in this battle. We are keen observers of what hooks audiences emotionally, sensorially and narratively in today’s fast-moving social media world. And we actively embed these learnings to get audiences to care just as deeply about human rights, environmental justice, democratic freedoms as we do. Indeed, moving people and missions forward is the beating heart of Rhizome Films. This is the simple philosophy underlying our work, whether it is promoting positive role-models in conflict zones to animated explainers that emphasise media freedom initiatives.  

So, what have we learnt in our journey so far? And what do we think makes creative work not just reach audiences but make a positive impact? This blog post features five principles that have helped storytellers not just get heard but make an impact.   

Laughter is the best medicine

Research shows that nothing moves audiences to reflect and act as much as humour. Think about Comic Relief. Since 1985, the charity has raised over £1.5 billion for a number of  causes – from fighting homelessness in the UK and famines in Sudan to funding HIV vaccination drives and setting up mental health support groups. The formula according to Jane Tewson, the founder of Comic Relief is making charity ‘active, emotional, involving and fun.’

For the last 40 years, dozens of high-profile celebrities have been willingly gunged, pranked, and parodied, before they asked highly-entertained audiences for donations. Films can change the world because they can make us feel, empathize, and ultimately compel us to act for a better world. Even if this empathy is evoked by the comic sight of Sir Lenny Henry slipping a disc while gyrating Tom Jones-style for millions watching television. Now juxtapose this image of a Sir Henry sprawled on stage clutching his back with that of a visibly moved Sir Henry at the opening of a healthcare facility in Uganda funded by Comic Relief audience donations. The contrast is striking and brings home to audiences the change their donations have made in the world and how they are behind their darling celebrity proud. When we make audiences laugh first, we earn the right to make them think—and ultimately, act.  

The message is in the eye of the perceiver

The secret to shifting the needle from simply communicating a message to behaviouraland systemic change is using stories as cognitive shortcuts or mental heuristics that bypass analytical resistance. In other words, we simply cannot afford to be boring in our messaging. Since 2016, armed gangs in Colombia have been actively recruiting teenagers in their ranks using Tik Tok and Facebook posts depicting gang members sporting weapons, wearing flashy clothes and driving sports cars. While there is increasing pressure mounted on the platforms to act, the crisis seems to be spiralling out of control with more than 118 teenagers including 51 minors reportedly recruited in the first quarter of 2025. In this scenario, we believe there is an urgent need to proactively counter the narrative of a glamorous life in an armed gang. Collaborating with a strong local network of influencers and leveraging the generative capacity of AI, our campaign centres youth leaders in science and technology, government and academia who narrate their powerful stories of achieving success, and shunned violence despite suffering personal losses. In an attention economy dominated by extremism, progressive storytellers must be more compelling than those who seek to divide us. 

Authenticity Trumps Production Value Every Time

The most powerful stories often emerge from the most unexpected places, told by voices that traditional media overlooks. In 2023, a simple iPhone video of a Pakistani climate activist speaking directly to camera while standing in flood waters reached 50 million people and generated more climate donations than most high-budget documentaries that year. This wasn’t an accident—audiences today have developed sophisticated filters for detecting manufactured authenticity versus genuine human experience. We’ve learned that communities affected by injustice are often their own best storytellers, requiring support rather than replacement. Our role as filmmakers shifts from being the voice to being the amplifier, providing technical expertise and practical guidance while ensuring voices from the community remain central. The key is creating frameworks that support these voices without sanitizing their power or co-opting their experiences for our own creative visions.

Timing Your Truth for Maximum Resonance

Even the most powerful story can fall flat if released at the wrong moment. Understanding news cycles, cultural conversations, and audience attention patterns is crucial for impact-driven storytelling. We call this ‘surfing the zeitgeist’ or in other words identifying moments when public consciousness is primed for specific messages, then delivering content that feels both timely and timeless. Consider how environmental documentaries perform differently during climate disasters versus economic downturns, or how stories about democratic freedoms resonate more powerfully during election cycles. This isn’t about opportunism, it is the ‘strategic’ epithet in strategic communication that embraces both the urgency of issues and the reality of human attention spans. Our work concerns just these issues, allowing our messages to remain timely and relevant in moments of heightened public interest. We believe in being responsive rather than reactive, contributing meaningfully to conversations rather than simply adding to the noise that already overwhelms audiences.

Build Bridges, Not Echo Chambers

Progressive storytelling faces a critical challenge: how do we reach beyond audiences who already agree with us? The most impactful work finds common ground before introducing challenging ideas, using shared values as entry points for deeper conversations about justice and democracy. This means understanding the concerns, fears, and aspirations of people across political divides, then crafting narratives that speak to universal human experiences while still advancing progressive goals. A film about worker rights might begin with stories of family obligation and personal pride before addressing systemic exploitation. Environmental content might start with community health concerns rather than polar ice caps. We’ve found that audiences are more willing to engage with challenging political content when it's framed through familiar emotional territories like parenting, community belonging, or economic security. This approach requires patience and nuance—we must resist the urge to immediately deliver ideological statements, instead building emotional investment that makes audiences more receptive to new perspectives. The payoff is reaching people who might otherwise dismiss progressive messages, expanding our coalition rather than simply energizing existing supporters.

The stakes have never been higher for progressive storytellers, but neither have the opportunities. By embracing these five principles, we can transform our films from mere documentation into engines of social change. The question isn't whether we can compete with extremist narratives—it's whether we're ready to tell stories so compelling that audiences choose hope over fear, connection over division, and truth over comfortable lies.

Suyash Brave