this just amused me:
Product Description (for a $10 pair of puma shorts)
This high quality pair of shorts has everything: moisture wicking, thermo-regulating, superventilating, shock resistant, reflective, UV-protecting! Keep you warm, guard your skin from the sting of oncoming pavement. Make you visible in headlights. And it won't get stinky!
Pretty awesome. Today, Sullivan had a link to an article about the difficulty of casting multi-racial commercials. In light of that article, I can't help wondering and the foregrounding of the Asian and the backgrounding of the African-American. Are Asians to be the new Best Friend Who Gets Killed?
Well, sure, that's what they're advertising. But I like the ad.
Am I a huge dork if my initial reaction is "that sucks, they didn't even bother trying to sync his hands with the music until the shot at the end where you can see the keys"?
Bruce Campbell, a man among men. I think I saw Army of Darkness like 4 times in the theatre.
Do the people who like the ad like it qua ad, qua hotties, qua mustard, what?
9: They like it because the canister resembles a penis, SB. If there's been any point of this blog up till now, it's that people like things that look like penises. Try to keep up.
I love the loungey, parodically hyper-macho rendition of Hungry Like the Wolf. The little bark at the end is genius.
Unfogged to little-used phrase: "we 0wnZ j00"
Also.
I like it because it's a confident yet knowingly cheesy ad for something that is known to be cheesy. There's something Shatneresque about it.
Precisely precisely. Shatner should've been paid more money for this ad than Duran Duran.
The Reel Big Fish version of Hungry Like the Wolf is my favorite.
I don't get it.
Great, start 'em young.
I use the old spice deodorant. I don't totally get the body wash concept though.
It is, however, no Man Dom. (Which ad is all the better because it wasn't humour.)
When did they redesign the bottle? It's more phallic now.
In light of that article, I can't help wondering and the foregrounding of the Asian and the backgrounding of the African-American. Are Asians to be the new Best Friend Who Gets Killed?
The ad starts with the African-American lady in the foreground, and the Asian isn't even in the room yet. Later on, the African-American is highly visible atop the piano. She's hardly getting the shaft, as it were.
That said, I remain a supporter of Asian foregrounding.
I remain a supporter of Asian foregrounding.
Don't we all.
Also, GB (and I say this truly without snark), that link in 23 was totally made for you.
I say this truly without snark
None taken.
23 -- where does his shirt go?
Duran Duran, cheesy singing, and Bruce Campbell? What's not to like? Awesome.
The ad in 23 has me sold. Where can I buy me some ManDom?
Where can I buy me some ManDom?
Are you sure you want Mandom? It's racist.
More on Mandom's Charles Bronson commercial here:
The Bronson commercials were an attempt to change the way men's toiletries were presented while utilizing associations of the West with progress, to promote a more modern, Western image for the then fifth place company in men's toiletries. According to the ad's creator:
"Until then, when making men's cosmetics we always portrayed a soft, gentle look and always used Japanese men. . . . When creating the [new] name for the product 'Mandom' the desire was to combine the idea of 'kingdom' or 'freedom' with the word MAN, creating the Idea of a 'man's world'. Until then the idea of cosmetics for men was to create a 'sweet smell'."
To go with the new image, a new bottle was designed to convey a sense of strength. This was achieved by making a huge cap, larger than the bottle. According to the creative director, '[t]he cap and bottle made a big impression. It conveyed a sense of strength rather than "sweetness".' To go along with this imagery, the ad makers decided to present a 'kitanai Amerika no otoko'--'a dirty American male'--in Mandom commercials, and featured Charles Bronson, looking all sweaty in grimy clothing. The catch-phrase used as a slogan for this promotional campaign was 'otoko no taishuu' or 'a man's body odour'. Until that time, according to the creative director, the word taishuu was considered a negative phrase with a rather bad connotation, having all the appeal of the analogous English 'body odour' or 'BO'. The idea of the advertising campaign was 'to take this negative thing and turn it into a plus'. In this instance, the use of Bronson as 'the dirty American male' with a 'man's BO' successfully accomplished these goals. Utilizing a foreigner made it easier to be this daring. Had the campaign backfired it would have been easier to revert to more conventional portrayals utilizing Japanese men than if a Japanese man had been used to break with the existing conventional expectations.
33: Oh, GB! Must you force me to choose between my principles and my Man Dom?
No one ever said Mandom was easy, MAE.
15: May I never have cause to read "Mustard, Monuments, and Media: A Pastiche."
They're good commercials alright, but I remained troubled by the product. If teenage boys start spending all of their money on perfume, who's going to support the violent videogame industry that is, in turn, propping up the alarmist media establishment? The whole thing's a house of cards, I tell ya.
22: I believe it's body spray (i.e., cologne) not body wash (i.e., soap). You put it on and then beautiful women can't wait to have sex with you.
The Bronson ad makes a lot more sense after reading 34.