Earlier this year, fast-food giant Burger
King announced they were releasing a limited edition ‘Flame-Grilled Fragrance’.
Said to evoke the scent of a cooked patty, it promised customers the experience
of ‘feel[ing] like they’re in a restaurant any time’. The fragrance was only
sold in Japan, and there only for one day (April 1st, natch.). How it
smelt, I’ll probably never know, but should I ever be struck by the urge to appropriate
the odour of barbequed meat, Naomi Goodsir’s Bois d’Ascèse presents as a very viable
solution.
The composition is built around a massively
smoky, phenolic cade/birchtar complex with some additional sweet woody accents coming from Iso E and perhaps guaiac. At such high concentration, this accord is unapologetic in
its grilled meatiness. The top includes some terpy citrus notes that introduce
an incense contrast. The latter however, only really becomes apparent in the
deep dry-down when much of the smoke has cleared.
What remains then is actually quite sensual and animalic, being a soft mix of
incense, musks, resins and moss (replacer).
It
was film critic Laura Mulvey who coined the phrase ‘male gaze’ in her 1975
essay ‘Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema’. Mulvey’s intention was to lay
bare the gender-power asymmetry in film and expose the ways in which females
are objectified by the camera’s outlook, which is most typically that of a
heterosexual man. To gaze, it is argued, implies more than to look: it orders power
and sexuality and renders women passive objects that exist for men’s
consumption. Whilst perfume adverts are no different in this connection from other forms of visual
media, Alexandre Courtès' recent film for Paco Rabanne’s Olympéa presents us with a remarkable fetishisation of the male gaze.
The advert’s
narrative traces the course of a straight, adolescent male’s wet dream, its
setting on ancient Mt.Olympos evoking mythic forms and providing ample
opportunities for Freudian shots of columns and arches:
Making
her way through Greek temple ruins, the anachronistically attired Olympéa actively
participates in her own spectaclisation, clapping her hands to attract the
attention of the godly male figures that line her path. With each new pair of
eyes that devour her image, the intensity of gaze increases, achieving climax
when finally she arrives at a cavernous pool penetrated by shafts of light. Pausing
as she enters its waters, Olympéa turns to meet our voyeuristic stare and by
this act, violates the rule of visual domination - much in the way of Manet's scandalous Olympia (1863). Suddenly it is we who are
subjected to the gaze’s power and experience all the embarrassment of a Peeping
Tom who has just been discovered. The emotional jolt that results is captured
in the final shower scene showing two naked males who, caught unawares by a
knowing Olympéa, clutch at their genitals. As the conclusion of the dream, this
also represents the moment the dreamer awakens to his nocturnal emission.
In
directing this advert, Courtès reportedly wanted ‘…to express a notion of power
without the use of force’; to showcase a ‘strong and beautiful woman that walks
with confidence and poise’ and who ‘didn’t have to choose between beauty and
intelligence, because she has it all’. Brava!
Olympéa, we’re invited to exclaim. Not for her the slavish task of emptying hydriai
over men! Not for her the adoption of subordinated postures before gazing
males! And yet, for all this (and Kanye
West’s blaring insistence), just how empowered is Olympéa?
Her power is directly proportional to her ability to achieve
objectification through a performance of beauty; to the degree that she can
embody the object of sight for a man’s pleasure, she is capable of subverting
his gaze. This dynamic affords Olympéa the potential to employ a jūdō like
power against her oppressor, but Courtès is keen to assure us it in no way
represents a serious challenge to the male order:
Through a gross exaggeration of relative size, the social
situation of women in Courtès’ film is expressed through their diminutive
stature. Driving a Matchbox car that is dwarfed even by a ghetto blaster, Olympéa
is nothing but a figurine; a play thing for otherwise bored males. In the
Head/Body economy of this world, a decapitated woman is still all body (cf.
critiques of ‘headless’ women in advertising), and a decapitated man is still
all head. This we are reminded of by the disembodied, male rock-face that
watches over the pool in which Olympéa bathes - a terrifying, totalitarian
symbol of gendered dominance.
And so it is that, by coopting elements from popular ‘women’s
empowerment’ movements, Courtès is able to reinforce a repressive, Patriarchal
ideology.
I’ve so far been very positive in my assessment of Pierre
Guillaume’s Collection Croisière and Métal Hurlant poses no exception. Inherent
in the idea of a cruise is a crossing and the two words share an etymological
link. Beyond the perfumes’ transportive powers however, lies a shared
intersecting of unusual themes. In Métal Hurlant, this novel crossing involves
leather and herbal notes.
The herbal complex is arranged around patchouli with
agrestic, linalool/linalyl acetate type accents and hints of licorice. This is
extended with some powerful (but not overpowering) woody-amber odorants that
really enliven the Suede(ral) dominated base.
The accompanying PR suggests the perfume is intended to
evoke the wild energy of a Harley tearing up an open road with the listed notes
including rubber tyre, chrome and gasoline accords. Whilst the composition does
indeed call to mind the idea of a greasy biker jacket, a (no doubt deliberate)
synthetic vibe prevents Métal Hurlant from ever achieving that second-skin
wearability of, say, Chanel’s Cuir de Russie.
Launched
in 1999, J’adore’s crowning moment arrived in 2011 when it replaced No.5 as the
top-selling female fragrance in France. Since then, its star may have dimmed a
bit, being partially eclipsed by Lancôme’s La Vie est Belle (2012), but J’adore
remains Dior’s highest selling perfume and was 2014’s second best selling
perfume overall. As such, it is unsurprising that the LVMH owned brand should
continue to invest heavily in its promotion.
The above
advert’s most salient symbol is gold: there’s gold writing, a gold flacon and a
gold model set against a gold background. It’s right there in the name, too:
J’adore, ‘(d’)or’ being French for
gold(en). A cursory reading of the text then, suggests it aims to communicate a
message of conspicuous luxury. In our blinged-out, rhinestone-encrusted age
however, Dior knows it needs to go beyond gaudy appeals to aspirationalism to
retain its market share:
By
illuminating the letter ‘o’, a matrimonial symbol viz. a gold ring is brought into
direct contact with the concept of love as expressed by the perfume’s name (‘I
love’, in English).
Viewed
another way, the ‘o’ is suggestive of a halo which, combined with reference to
marriage (historically a sacred institution) creates a religious subtext with a
devotional imperative. These messages are reinforced through a strong continuity
of image that has seen ‘screen goddess’ Charlize Theron hang on as the face of
J’adore for over a decade.
In
terms of its marketing strategy then, it would appear that rather than attempting
to woo new consumers away from caremellic gourmands, Dior is instead looking to encourage loyalty amongst
J’adore’s existing customer base by evoking traditional themes of fidelity.
