If you haven’t already, make sure you make time to watch Werner Herzog’s new documentary on the dangers of texting and driving.
At 35 minutes, it’s long for a PSA. It was sponsored by AT&T, with the support of the other three major wireless carriers—Verizon, Spring, and T-Mobile—and created with the help of AT&T’s agency, BBDO New York. You may want to spread it across a few viewings. There are natural breaking points, with a format that tracks four different stories of devastating accidents, told by the people involved—victims, perpetrators, families, and responding officers. But get through the whole thing.
The first story is about Xzavier Davis Bilbo, an 8-year-old paralyzed from the diaphragm down after a driver distracted by texting ran a four-way stop sign and hit him while he was crossing the street with his sister. Narrated in large part by his mother, it’s heartbreaking enough on its own.
But there’s powerful insight throughout the entire half-hour, much of it in the conversations with the two drivers—Chandler Gerber and Reggie Shaw—who agreed to appear on camera. Each killed more than one person, in separate accidents. While you’ll probably want to hate both of them, they don’t make it as easy as you might think.
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