Canadian Club: A View of Masculinity

These ads for Canadian Club are undoubtedly attractive and catchy. The color of the photographs are warm and saturated, the typography is aesthetically pleasing and attention-grabbing, and the message is strong and demanding. What’s interesting about this ad is that the product is at the very end of the message; in other words, it seems to be more of an afterthought than anything else and it is the trail of thought the viewer must follow that gives strength to the product itself. The success of the ad is contingent upon the associations that the viewer gleans from the ad—associations that are superimposed upon the product later: sharp, masculine, smart, and sexy.

In this ad campaign, Canadian Club is relying very explicitly on a narrow and categorical definition of masculinity, a view of heteronormative masculinity that involves sex, fishing, shaving, and cocktails—all of which—for a real man, according to these ads—are effortless. What’s not included in this definition of masculinity? Metrosexuality. Pilates. Moisturizing. Pink cocktails. And certainly not abstinence, says Canadian Club. These are modern buzzwords that Canadian Club relegates to femininity, suggesting that their whisky drink is both classic and masculine—because YOUR dad (also classic and masculine) drank it. That’s “damn right”—your dad—who slept with other girls before your mom, who got two numbers in one night, who went fishing instead of doing pilates—drank whisky cocktails, and they tasted good. So if you want to be as manly as your dad—the manliest hero of them all—do the manly thing and drink some Canadian club.

The aesthetics of these ads command a dreamy nostalgia of an imagined past—because the audience they are addressing must be young—given that the people in these 70s-era photos include “your dad.” This assumes that the viewer has not lived in the 60s or 70s but have parents that did. And despite this constructed fantasy of masculinity and the contrived photos that come along with it, nostalgia is (and may always be) trendy. Nowadays, people fetishize past decades, associating particular aesthetics, bands, fashions, and attitudes with the 20s, the 50s, the 70s, the 90s—you name it. This yearning for a past we never experienced is comforting in the face of accelerating technology, I’m sure—and it’s why we revel in Instagram and Hipstamatic, mobile apps that create sepia-toned and faded photos reminiscent of Polaroids; it’s why we are advocates of vinyl and find vintage fashions novel. And Canadian Club smartly capitalizes on this nostalgia.

Pilates? Metrosexuals? Moisturizing? Pink cocktails? Those are sissy creations of the 21^st century. You really want to be a man? The kind of man who existed in the 70s? (Yeah, those were real men). Well then, you better drink up—because Canadian Club is the way to manhood.

The Secret

This Campari ad was released in February 2005 Italy. The agency in charge of production was D'adda Lorenzini Vigorelli BBDO.

 What is your most visceral reaction after watching this?

This ad is called "The Secret" - a title which in and of itself is loaded with  meaning. The "secrets" here are layered, the first layer being a personal secret: each of the two transgendered characters, dressed in formal attire for some kind of gala or party, harbor secrets which are revealed in a second secret: a secret rendezvous in which true identities come to the surface. Both of these secrets are tied into Campari's branding of their alcoholic drink as being derived from an old and ancient "secret recipe" - a link which - though it provides a framework for this ad - is realized only as an afterthought (because that's what the intellectualized message that underlies an ad (the signification) usually becomes).

Let's start at the surface of this ad, at the narrative line. The scene is set at a cocktail party with red carpet (Campari is red), and from a distance, we see (what we assume to be) a woman in a black backless dress ascending a white staircase. The ad cuts to an androgynous-looking figure wearing a suit and tie (the apparel suggest this figure is a man, though the face seems to have both effeminate and masculine qualities), who is at a bar. There is a moment in which the woman in the dress turns around at the top of the staircase, presumably making eye contact with the figure in the suit, and it is in this moment that an intention is understood. The figure in the suit grabs a glass of Campari (another "secret") and follows the woman in black through large empty rooms until he(?)* catches up with her. In this confrontation, as she turns around, he, still in motion, spills his Campari on her - more specifically, in between her breasts, where her halter dress plunges. There is a sultry moment in which she gazes intensely at him, and then undoes her dress, revealing a masculine body with no breasts at all. She smears her lipstick with the back of her hand, and in response, he opens up his dress shirt, revealing breasts that have been bound, and then lets down his hair. The ad ends with an overlay of the words, "Campari. Red passion," with the two figures staring intensely at each other in the background.

*The English language actually works in favor of binary categories of gender because people are generally relegated to "he" and "she," while there is no pronoun for someone who does not identify clearly with either of those categories. "It" can be used but has a derogatory, animalistic connotation. In this advertisement, "he" and "she" are not clearly defined, but because I am limited by the constraints of the English language, "she" and "he" here referred to the assumed sexes of the figures prior to the revelation of their respective secrets.

What is the selling point of this narrative? Campari sells itself on the idea of passion (as well as its secret recipe), and this secret rendezvous is supposed to represent that passion: a passion that is illicit erotic, and risque, that transgresses normative bounds, and that is intensely personal and revelatory. Of course, this selling point rests on the very assumptions that Judith Butler decries: the assumption that heterosexuality is the norm while homosexuality or transexuality or anything other than heterosexuality is the "other." Our visceral reaction to this ad depends on our assumptions of sexuality. Are we indignant that this secret has to be a "secret" at all (the two figures are "coming out" to one another)? Why is this particular act a "secret" at all? If indeed heterosexuality is not "normative" then the shock value of this ad might decrease. Perhaps Campari is capitalizing on both the fascination with and fetishization of transgendered individuals while exploiting the assumption that the transsexual is the "other" - the being which must be kept (pun intended) under wraps.

**Other things to consider:
-Norms regarding men pursuing women (and vice versa)

-Ethnicity and "gender-bending"?

Watch 'Em While You're High

Advertisers tend to know their target audiences – how to get their blood pumping, their mouths watering, and their Youtube search engines running. Commercials are designed to provoke an emotional or physical reaction in the viewer, and they're no fun when you’re obviously not part of the target audience (Magical Disney Family Cruises, Viagra). However, it can be entertaining to sit back and watch a commercial that's meant for someone else. Like earlier this week, I was mid-episode of Modern Family, suffering through one of those forced commercial breaks, when an Axe commercial came on that was definitely targeting dudes. It was funny, and I watched with smug detachment.

One of the most frequently overlooked, but substantially large commercial-viewing demographics is Stoners. The beautiful thing about Stoners is that (almost) every commercial is meant for them. When you’re high, a ten-second, digital close-up of microbes being demolished by some Febreeze-wieldin’ housewife can feel utterly profound. Raisin Bran looks infinitely delectable. The Bachelorette is literally the funniest show to ever grace reality TV. But while 99.9% of commercials may appeal to Stoners, they can be sorted into three distinct categories: Intentionally Interesting, Accidentally Fascinating, and Slyly Mesmerizing.

In recent years, the first category (Intentionally Interesting to Stoners) seems to be largely going out of style. In the seventies, I guess advertisers expected the vast majority of their viewers to be slouchily sucking down jays while they watched TV, because even Rice Krispies commercials were obscenely trippy. But Levi’s Jeans (our good ol’ fashioned American Co) might just win the prize for Best Commercial to Watch While High.

One slightly more recent example of Intentionally Interesting is the Carlton Blonde Beer commercial. However, if you’re of the Stoner variety that gets more-than-kinda paranoid, it may cause you to feel unduly anxious that the world is unravelling. The classic Sony Bravia commercial, (otherwise known as "the ball commercial,") comes across like the brainchild of a bunch of weed lovin' graphic designers with a penchant for indie rock. At the very least, it’s relaxing; on a good high, it feels spiritual.

Lately, the Accidentally Fascinating to Stoners category seems to be on the rise. These are commercials that are mildly interesting to the general public, but that feel terrifying, euphoric or intriguing when you’re high. For instance, there's the apocalyptic feeling that hits you when you're watching Pepsi’s Shaq Attack commercial. The plot goes like this: Pepsi-drinkers in various locales around the globe stare in shock and desperation as their Pepsi bottles drain mysteriously in front of their eyes, presumably into some invisible cosmic sinkhole. You're waiting in shoulder-tensed agony for a cataclysmic clincher -- so when the commercial ends with the suggestion, "Be Young, Have Fun," it feels like some kinda SICK JOKE.

In a similar vein, there's the Duracell Batteries Ultra Lithium commercial, in which a horde of pink bunnies morph en masse into an aggressive monster-giant comprised entirely of living, screaming bunny-faces. I'm pretty sure this commercial is scary to the average viewing-audience, but if you’re high, it could make you want to lie down in an empty bathtub, turn off the lights and cry/ write poems about the coercive mechanisms of capitalism.

Slyly Mesmerizing is perhaps the most sinister category -- a reminder that, yes, advertisers really, really know what they’re doing. Not only do these commercials seem perfectly unsuspicious to a regular viewing audience, they may even appear innocent to a True Stoner during rare moments of sobriety. But if you're peering at the commercial through weed-stained eyes and droopy lids, the subliminal messages come screaming off the screen. For example, one of Taco Bell’s recent commercials looks pretty regular – a dude at a fancy restaurant who really just wants a burrito – when all of a sudden, a dancing spiral of meat explodes into the background, twisting and gyrating, eight feet tall and oozing with delicious, rhythmic grease. Sure, it’s only up there for two seconds. But if you’re high, it's a mind-bomb that will explode half an hour later when you're careering through red lights on your way toward some Late Nite TB.

Of course, the exploitation of marijuana-induced consumer vulnerability is nothing new. The older Taco Bell commercials were even more shamelessly manipulative. For a list of great hypothetical weed ads, check out this article by blogger Tess Lynch at Good Health, where she invented a few perfect commercials for stoners. And Watch Responsibly!