1st timed essay

‘Lynx Touch’ advert

The ‘Lynx touch’ advert is a promotional and informative advert, which is used to inform the audience about the product and also encourages them to buy the product. ‘Lynx’ is a product which is specifically aimed at the male sector of the public and the adverts centre around that with their being mostly women in the adverts but only one man, showing the dominance the man has over the women.

This advert centres most of its editing and media language on the notion that ‘sex sells’ and that can be seen through a number of shots and through the mise-en-scene as well. The shots that are used in this advert are particularly noticeable when it comes to the representations of the different cast members starring in the advert. ‘Lynx’ being the institution of this advert and also the product being shown have chosen to show one man who is wearing lynx, which is not typical of a lynx advert, which normally follows Todorov’s theory of the equilibrium. Normally, there is a man who needs lynx and can’t get a woman, however when he sprays the lynx on, all of the women around him go crazy for him and he dominates them at the end. This advert is slightly different with the man walking in and the camera zooms into the faces and bodies of the women to show how they are getting affected by the product. The ideologies behind the advert have remained conservative, as the known narrative of a lynx advert is that for men, if you are wearing lynx you will get all of the women and if you’re not wearing lynx, you won’t get any women.

The setting of the advert is in an office cabin in what looks like the middle of nowhere, but there are women who are sitting at desks with papers and office material and this goes someway to confirm to the old stereotype of women and how some women were the sexy secretary type and were professional but they were also provocative and promiscuous. The women in this advert are represented in the same manner, with there being work going on but the camera zooms in the one woman’s collarbone and catches a bead of sweat dripping down and the woman here is being objectified as a sex object with her making sexual movements and sexual noises. This is a technique used by the institution which is designed to attract and appeal to their target audience, which is the male sector of the audience. Throughout the duration of this advert, the women are being objectified and the male audience are being attracted, so this advert is confirming to Laura Mulvey’s theory of the male gaze.

The music in the advert is also of a sexually teasing nature with the music being vey slow at the start and in the middle, which creates a sense of tension within the advert and within the audience. The music only changes right at the end when the man sits down on his chair and opens his book and the woman who is sitting opposite him, her buttons of her shirt start opening. This is another example of the notion that is being followed of ‘sex sells’ and this is the main shot that will attract the institutions target audience, the men who will be passive at this stage of the advert. One of the main reasons for the male audience to be passive is because of the advert using the hypodermic syringe model to good effect, as the are brainwashing the male brain an also putting in their brains the notion of without lynx, getting women just is not possible.

However, some members of the male sector of the audience will take an oppositional reading to this advert, as they may already have women so they will feel no need to use or purchase this product. The male dominating the women is an ideology which is shown right throughout the advert, shown by the man unzipping his case and the woman’s boots being unzipped, when the man adjusts the reception on the radio, one of the woman’s breast’s are becoming aroused, and this is the institution mediating the truth to make it seem as if with Lynx, women are at a man’s feet, which reflects the patriarchal society we live in.