Dove - Evolution Commercial

This is one of the latest Dove commercials, part of their "campaign for real beauty." Even though this is a short clip with no dialogue, I think it can be effectively analyzed from a number of different lenses.

From a feminist perspective, this ad is quite interesting. Dove assumes that their audience has become familiar with the typical gender images portrayed in advertising-- that is, that females are often sexualized and that there is defined norm of how females must look to be attractive. In this commercial, and in their entire campaign, Dove works to overturn that stereotypical media representation and highlights the fact that a defined norm for what is beautiful is a myth. This commercial is geared towards a female audience, but, more specifically, it is aimed towards females who are tired of seeing their gender represented in the typical way. As the viewer sees the actress in this commercial undergo an unnatural transformation, there leaves no room for doubt that media has skewed society's understanding of "beauty." It is also interesting to note, though, that another underlying assumption of Dove commercials like this one is the cultural construction that females want to be viewed as beautiful. Furthermore, these ads make it easy for the viewer to forget that Dove is, in the end, a company that wants to sell their products-- products such as lotion, hair spray, and make-up that all are intended in some way or another to alter one's appearance. On the one hand, this ad breaks the mold of the typical media portrayal of women and beauty, and I applaud it for that. On the other, though, it continues to buy into the construction of female beauty in the first place.

On a related note, this is an interesting commercial to consider in terms of a semiotic analysis. As the actress is "made-up" to mirror the stereotypical image of female "beauty", take note of what is being altered and how. The skin is smoothed, the make-up is put on, and the hair is curled and blown-- but then, the image is captured into a computer for further manipulation. One of the changes that stood out to me most was that they enlargened her eyes. I had never really thought about it before, but that highlighted to me what a symbol eyes are in our society. Even though it's sometimes hard to figure out what color someone's eyes are even by looking directly at them, eye color is nearly always used in a description of someone's appearance. In regards to beauty, eyes definitely get a lot of attention. Eyeliner, eye shadow, eyelash curlers, mascara-- what other facial feature has as many different types of make-up devoted to it?