In this Dove commercial, the media uses the male gaze, the internalized gaze, and almost a type of heterosexual gaze, but not in the usual way that commercials do. Dove has made a name for themselves in representing real women, and this commercial does just that by showing that the unrealistic beauty ideal that almost every woman strives to reach is attainable-through Photoshop. In the commercial, Dove make-up artists, hairdressers, and Photoshop experts work to transform an average woman (who may be a model, it is unstated) into an unrealistic billboard model, which does not seem that unrealistic to those of us watching because we are so used to seeing this insane beauty ideal on the covers of magazines and in all types of commercials. The amount of time and effort spent changing this woman into what is thought to be beautiful to society is ridiculous. How the woman looks after the transformation is where the three gazes mentioned before come into play. Because women have been shown and told that this is what is beautiful, they have an internalized gaze on themselves to try to make themselves look this way. Most women feel the need to have perfected longer, wavier, voluptuous, and most times, blonde hair. Most women feel the need to have perfect, smudge-free make-up with shapely arched eyebrows and slightly rosy cheeks. And most women also feel the need to be thin. How the picture of the woman changed in Photoshop shows them making her neck longer, shoulders lower, and face thinner-all tricks to make the already healthy looking woman look even thinner. All of these things that are a part of the internalized gaze are also apart of the male gaze, because it is what a male typically prefers to see. I also mentioned the idea of a heterosexual gaze because what this woman is changed into is a very typical heterosexual woman, that heterosexual men would prefer. This billboard would not attract many lesbian women (let alone gay men); therefore, limiting the billboard audience to heterosexual males and females. (Brown).
I also feel that this commercial calls attention to the fact that most other means of advertising implicitly promote the idea of thinness, but this commercial I feel does not promote it itself. Dove addressed the idea of thinness by editing the picture of the woman in Photoshop just as any other form of media would. They made her neck longer, shoulders lower, and face thinner in order to implicitly promote the idea that if a woman is this thin, and looks like this, then she can be a billboard model too, and she can be as beautiful as any other model. I feel that Dove made very specific efforts to show that this woman as a “finished product” is what is seen more often than not in advertising, and that it is not necessarily what Dove feels is the most beautiful, or how women should be. The statement at the end of the commercial, “No wonder our perception of beauty is distorted,” truly sums up what the media is doing to our society-distorting our ideas about beauty and thinness.
Again, Dove shows how many other advertisements implicitly call upon consumerism, but this time, they also implicitly call on consumerism, though in a different way. Dove shows how most advertisements promote, as I stated above in regards to thinness, that if a woman purchases a specific beauty or clothing item, then she can be just as beautiful as the models used in those advertisements. But what Dove also shows, is still an implicit call to consumerism, but as the anti-unrealistic beauty ideal. Dove tries to sell themselves to women as almost adding to their natural beauty, and promoting them to be themselves, and that they are just as beautiful as others when they are themselves. In the end as far as consumerism is concerned, Dove is just like any other company trying to sell their merchandise, but the way they do it makes all the difference. Overall, Dove succeeds at showing what typical commercials do by implicitly promoting thinness, consumerism, and unrealistic beauty ideals; while also making a statement about what real beauty is not.
Brown, Adriane. The Fat Body. 2009.
Brown, Adriane. WNTW and The Internalized Gaze. 2009.