Angela N. Carroll
The commercial Don’t be deceived by its look (2005) posted by junjie1800, was selected from videos returned from a search for any content including the tags “nigger” & “commercial” on youtube.com. It is 1:01 minutes long, shot from the perspective of a passive onlooker. The product is Thai toothpaste, whose slogan is “Appearance can be deceiving. Black Herbal Toothpaste”.
Wide shot: A little girl is loudly crying at the bottom of a large grey pole. A tall African/Black man wearing athletic wear (black tank-top and grey shorts) walks towards her from the left. The mans height dwarfs the girls. Soft music starts to play in the background. He looks down at her. The girl points upward. The man looks up in the direction she is pointing. The camera pans up the pole, which is a lamppost. The camera stops at the top of the lamppost. A yellow balloon floats at the top.
Close up shot: The man looks up at the balloon, then looks down at the little girl.
Extreme Wide shot: The man climbs up the pole (similar to King Kong). The music includes a child singing a melody (la la la la) over violins and a xylophone.
Close up shot: The man continues to climb up the lamppost. He reaches upward to grab a yellow balloon, and places the string in his mouth. He slides down the pole clenching the balloon string in his teeth. A cityscape is in the background.
Extreme wide shot: The man continues sliding downward with the balloon. The lamppost towers over the camera.
Wide shot: The man slides down onto the base of the lamppost. The little girl is still standing at the bottom. The girl stares at the balloon. The man takes the balloon from his mouth, steps down from the base and reaches toward the girl with the balloon. The girl reaches up and walks toward the balloon. A woman runs from the left towards the little girl, grabs her, turns her towards her, and begins quickly picking her up.
Over the shoulder shot: The man is in the foreground. The woman is in the middle ground. A stone ground is the background. The woman frantically picks up the little girl while yelling and running away from the man.
Mid shot: The position of the camera changes. The woman and child are in the foreground. The man is in the middle ground. The lamppost is in the background. The woman runs from the left past the man. The man is still holding out the balloon. The camera begins to slowly zoom out. The man recedes the hand holding the balloon and sadly looks towards the direction the woman and child ran.
Screen fades to black
Wide shot: Fade in. The man walks from the left with his head down still holding the yellow balloon. A green trash can, light-pole, cement wall, and tree tops are in the background.
Screen fades to black
Wide shot: Fade in. The camera looks down from a high position. The man opens and walks through an apartment entrance. The man is still holding the balloon. A picture of a black dog hangs on the grey apartment walls. The man turns and closes the door.
Medium Close Up shot: Quick cut to ceiling. The yellow balloon drifts up towards the ceiling. Eight other balloons, (three purple, four red) have already been floating at the ceiling. The yellow balloon settles in with the other balloons at the apartment ceiling.
Mid shot: The mans head is hanging down. The background is the grey apartment wall. The bottom of a lamp is cropped at the top of the shot. The man lifts his head up and looks directly at the camera. The man turns his body to the left and begins to lay backwards.
Wide shot: The man lays backward onto the head of a large toothbrush positioned in the corner of the room. The toothbrush is the mans bed. Beside it sits a wooden nightstand with a white lamp and glass of water on top. A white curtain cover a window behind the nightstand. A picture hangs above the mans head. The floor is hardwood. A tiny rug covers a small portion of the floor beside the toothbrush. The man turns his back towards the camera and faces the wall.
Wide shot: Composite fade out/in. The mans body transforms into black toothpaste laying in the same position on the toothbrush head. The apartment fades away into grey/green bathroom. The camera zooms out. A deep masculine voice speaks in a non-english language. White text at the bottom reads (Appearance can be deceiving.) The toothbrush is sitting on a glass counter next to a green and white toothpaste carton. Grey tile is in the background.
Wide shot: Camera continues to zoom out. The deep masculine voice speaks in a non-english language. White text at the bottom reads (Black Herbal toothpaste). A circular green logo with white script appears above the toothpaste carton. The deep masculine voice fades out. The childlike background music continues. The screen cuts to black.
I chose this sequence out of 140 videos that returned from a search for tags including “nigger” & “commercial”. It was the eleventh video listed. I conducted this search with several questions in mind:
• How many commercials would be referenced with the tag “nigger”.
• What the products of the commercials were
• How/if the product related to the tag “nigger”
This sequence was constructed for the audience to have an empathetic passive stance. Empathy from the audience is first evoked with the initial loss of the girls balloon. When the man’s efforts to help the little girl are unrealized, his self worth is lost, creating a catalyst for a sympathetic audience.
The sequence construction is thematic. The color scheme (black, grey, blue, green) and reoccurring lamp imagery linearly connect each scene back to the beginning of the sequence and associated trauma. The directors usage of extreme wide shots and camera tilts exaggerates the height of the man, as well as the lamppost, which is construed to epic proportions. Many of the shots used within the sequence are reminiscent of King Kong films. The Man literally embodies King Kong mannerisms in this sequence. I find the scenes with the man climbing the phallus lamppost most intriguing, disturbing, and problematic for this reason. It is not only the way in which he climbs, but also the gesturing he uses (clinches the balloon is his teeth), that hint at animal-like characteristics. Moreover, The Man never verbally speaks, but communicates through facial and body expressions that reflect his emotions. This type of dialogue is also characteristic of human-animal research, especially that regarding The Great Ape Language of Sue Savage-Rumbaugh
The Man is passive, innocent, but still presumed to be dangerous. His dilemma, like that of King Kong, is that society fears him as a result of his appearance that differs from the social norm. The Mans dark complexion and extreme height are symbolized as non-normative/nonhuman. It is interesting to note that the woman, and child are also people of color, and yet there racial signifiers in contrast with The Mans are lighter, and thus illustrated as being normative/human. The Mans unthreatening attributes are hidden by his unabashed blackness. This theme is highlighted in the toothpaste slogan “Appearance can be deceiving” which is revealed at the end of the sequence. The contrasts with the innocence of the girl, who was not afraid of the man, and the terror of the woman, are also interesting.
I found the commercial interesting in the most devastating way. Upon first glance, I was simply shocked and confused by the juxtaposition of the images and content. However, while creating the shot analysis, which required the commercial to be replayed multiple times, the images and associations distressed me a great deal. Perhaps, it was the blatant correlations between black man=animal, black man= lonely, black man=other, black man=danger, which I found incredibly troubling though these themes are not new to mass media. I thought it even more interesting that the commercial was from Thailand, considering that they are people of color who have also experienced social & economic oppression. This sequences construction therefore, which heavily relies on the symbolic embodiment of negative and animalistic imagery in reference to African/Black people, as a means for increased capital, is disgusting and dangerous.
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