'Bittersweet Blessings' - Etiqa Chinese New Year 2026
1. Film & Branded Content Kancils [1.2a Film (Online): Single]
creative assets
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Links:
Product/Service:
Festive Web Film CNY
Client:
Etiqa
Brief:
Chinese New Year is the moment Malaysian families pause to reflect on what truly matters. As an insurer and takaful provider whose purpose is protecting families, Etiqa wanted to use this moment to earn trust at a deeper level, not through product, but through empathy. The brief called for a festive film grounded in an authentic Malaysian Chinese family experience: a story families would see themselves in, talk about around the reunion table and share. It needed to honour the warmth of the season while carrying a truth with real weight, leaving audiences with the sense that Etiqa understands the quiet responsibilities Malaysian families carry for one another, and is there for them through it all.
Solution:
Malaysia is fast becoming an ageing nation, and a generation is caught in the middle: raising children while caring for ageing parents. The sandwich generation is often in the news, yet rarely seen in our festive stories, where family is pictured only as reunion and abundance. We wanted to show the love behind the reunion. Bittersweet Blessings opens with 12-year-old Yang at a school speech contest, proudly sharing what his father taught him: leave reunion dinner early, pick the easy job, let mum be the breadwinner, don’t aim too high. The hall murmurs. We judge him too. Then the film turns. Every ‘failure’ was a sacrifice, made by a son caring for his own ailing father. Told through a child’s eyes, the film reframes filial piety not as duty but as quiet, unseen love, asking Malaysians to look again at those carrying two generations at once. And it positions Etiqa as the brand that sees them.
