Overview
A kawaii animated film built around a 500-year-old Japanese folktale, made to launch an Indian-Japanese rice chip brand with curiosity and appetite. Not a product ad. A story people actually wanted to finish.
Client:
Kari Kari by Daawat Kameda
Product or Service:
Brand Animation Film
Industry
FMCG / Snacks
Deliverables
Scripting, Storyboarding, 2D Animation, Original Music and Score
Kari Kari is not a straightforward product. It is a joint venture between Daawat Rice, India's leading rice brand, and Kameda Seika, the largest rice cracker company in Japan with nearly 30% market share. The product carries genuine heritage on both sides. The challenge was to introduce it to an Indian audience in a way that honoured that origin without turning it into a history lesson. The goal was intrigue. Build curiosity around the product before explaining it. Make people want to know more before they even know what they are eating.
The Solution
The answer was storytelling. Specifically, a story within a story.
The script opens with grandchildren asking their grandfather for a tale. He obliges. Five hundred years ago, in the village of Yoshino, life was peaceful until one night the village shook with loud, rumbling growls. The brave warrior Sabaurao Kari took up his katana and followed the sound deep into the dark. He found a pair of haunting eyes. When he asked why the creature was growling, the demon told him he was cursed and the only thing that could break the curse was something spiritually satisfying to eat.
Kari returned to the village. Together, the villagers prepared a bowl. He brought it back. The demon ate. The curse lifted, and in its place stood a beautiful woman.
The grandchildren lean in: tell us more.
That was the ending. Not a resolution, a cliffhanger. A teaser designed to leave the audience wanting the next chapter.
The visual style was kawaii 2D flat animation, soft and characterful, leaning into Japanese aesthetics without being a pastiche. Custom music and score were composed to match the pacing of the narrative, shifting from warm and storybook-gentle to tense and atmospheric as Kari walks into the dark. The motion graphics were built to suit the brand rather than a generic animation house template.
What was built
Original script and full storyboard developed from concept. 2D flat kawaii animation produced end to end. Custom music composition and sound score created specifically for the film. Motion graphics integrated to suit Kari Kari's brand identity. A complete brand film designed as the first chapter of a larger story.
Result
The film did what good brand storytelling does. It made people curious about the product without selling at them. The folktale format gave Kari Kari cultural roots that felt earned rather than manufactured. Audiences engaged with the narrative and the cliffhanger format created the exact kind of appetite the brand needed at launch: people wanting more, in every sense.
