Thesis: The Thirsty for beer advert is a perfection depiction of how the modern society appreciates having fun and being wild.
Introduction
Advertisements provide a medium for companies to communicate important features of their products to customers (Terkan 240).Famous ads have affected the culture of societies and its people. The classic case of adverts and their contribution to culture is the Soap Operas that came to be known as Soaps because the soap manufacturer, Procter & Gamble, sponsored all drama series of the early 20th century (Procter & Gamble). Today, many people do not even know where the term came from, but they appreciate that Soaps are part of the current Television content. In this paper, a beer advert, known as ‘thirsty for beer' that was shot in Australia, will be analyzed to make reconciliation with the thesis, that the advert reflects the modern ‘fun culture.'
Ideology
The beer commercial opens with a man sitting at the beach alone. He has a cooler full of beer bottles, where he drinks them very fast, and one by one. As he pulls a bottle from the cooler, a feminine voice is heard in the background, saying the words thirsty. At last, after he opens the last bottle, and wearing a satisfied expression, a lady emerges from the water in a bikini and walks straight to him. The man is dazzled by her beauty and the perfect legs which make him miss a moment of concentration.
Upon getting close to him, the lady looks directly into his eyes, takes his cowboy hat and wears it, then takes the beer off his hands. She gobbles the beer as if she has had nothing to drink for many years, with some of it overflowing down to her chest. The lady in the advert is Zilda Williams, an Australian actress and the man is just an average cowboy. At the end of the advert, the lady sighs in relief and says ‘never hungry, always thirsty,' in a sexy tone.
Critical analysis
This section will deconstruct the perspective and creative process that was used in making the advert, to (or "intending to") understanding why the color choice and camera angles were important in the making of the advert. First, the advert physical location is a beach in Australia, where blue water can be seen washing the sand at the shore. The weather is fine; not perfectly crisp or sky clear, but that kind of weather that has beautiful cloud patterns donning the skyline.
The choice of the beach as the physical location of the advert is designed to transport viewers from the comfort of their seats to a fun situation. When people pack up and fly to beautiful beach locations like Morocco or the Indian Ocean, they are set to have a good time, be carefree and enjoy themselves. In many cases, it will be very off to find a lady who is fully dressed in a beach, as the universal construction is that one has to be in a bikini.
The weather is clear, a beautiful day for enjoyment. Choosing a weather situation that many people in Australia could identify with helps in localizing the advert makes people feel that they can easily have a similar kind of fun. For people looking to go on holiday in the country, the advert serves to remind them that there are perfect places, and kind weather in Australia and one does not have to fly out to enjoy their vacation.
The decision to shoot the ad within the borders of Australia helps in promoting the beer as a local brand of choice. For instance, a Budweiser advert will not be very thrilling for US audience if it is shot in Cape Town, South Africa, for example. People associate beer brands with national pride, and beer lovers across the world love to see their local brand in a foreign location. In essence, the target audience for a national beer advert is the citizens of that country, as it helps in creating a sense of national pride.
A beer moment is usually a cool moment. The choice of the music at the background helps in making the moment feel so peaceful and entertaining. The music flows with every sip, and the fact that the advertisers chose soft music complements the solitude, or just the aspect of being alone, for the man drinking beer. Normally, people can drink in public places, in groups or just alone at home, when they want to have a private moment. In the latter case, a music choice would be just cool and calm music, like blues, R n B or urban pop music, and for the senior citizens, some classic country music.
Adverts act as reflections of societal values and norms. In that vein, most people will agree that beer lovers would do with company, and for men, a female company makes it spicy. That is perhaps the part of the advert that ruffled feathers with moralists and conservatives. A female voice is heard in the background every time the man finishes a beer. The voice bewilders him, and he is seen removing his stunners and looking around as if to confirm whether he heard it right. The fact that the female voice pronounces the word thirsty makes him yearn to see the source of the sound, and even the owner. Revelers across the world have used the term 'boos and booze', and this particular advert puts it to perfect illustration. The fact that the advert makes the use of a star for the female role and an ordinary man for the male role serves to create the impression of dreaming, where, after a beer, a man has the courage to approach any lady and talk to her. It is a reflection of what most people feel about themselves when they have had several beers down their throats.
The camera keeps a focus on the lady as she emerges from the water and walks majestically to the man. The blending of the soft voice with a perfect body image, at least perfect to normal standards, strays a little bit from the beer theme to a sexual issue. The camera focus on the legs of the lady, revealing her ‘beaver breather' sprouts desire and lust from viewers. A beaver breather is a the space between the legs of a woman, and it is known as a lustful feature for many men, a fact that has made women o work hard in the gyms to get that figure.
The sexy voice and the lady character are designed to create a situational irony. The expectation of the man is that the woman is thirsty for sexual pleasure. However, going by the way she takes gulps of the beer, it is clear that she was thirsty just for a beer. It could be viewed as a disappointing feature of the advert, but it achieves the objective of the creator. The situational irony creates a memory and embeds the beer experience in the minds of the viewers. In the end, we appreciate the lady for her performance, and her successful staging of two ironies; thirsty – when she has been in the water – and thirsty for beer when the man who gives her the beer is thinking about sexual pleasures, going by the angles of the camera.
Social values and target social groups
The social values assigned to beer are mostly to do with enjoyment and vacation. Beer and alcohol generally, is a common drink in social events like weddings and corporate dinners. From that perspective, one can argue that beer is a product that ties people socially by relaxing their thoughts and actions. That feature of beer as a social product is enhanced in the advert as a viewer could not judge the man to be an alcoholic, given the environment from where he is drinking.
While many people appreciate beer and its positive use in social situations, it can be a source of addiction and ill health, when abused or overused. That is where the importance of having target groups for advertising comes in. If this advert was done in an office set up, for example, with, say, a man with dozens of files on his desk trying to complete an assignment on time, it could mean different, even if it was the same man in this beach environment. Hence, it was a big win for the advertiser to choose a perfect setting for the advert.
The use of a beach set up for a beer advert serves as a motivator for people who are looking for opportunities to go on vacation. That means that the ideology of having a beer and perfect company enthuses drinkers to look of partners as they decide on what to do in their vacation. An ideal situation would be one that would have family members, colleagues and partners such as girlfriends or boyfriends going out for vacation, Hence, relating to the advert, it would have been ideal to have a group of people identify with the quality of the beer as opposed to a few lone men who enjoy every drop of it. The beach setting is perfect, but it could do with enhancements in terms of the number of characters and the kind of activities that are going on in the surrounding areas. In an advert that aims at interesting people on the kind of fun that can happen at the beach during vacation, it is important to have a perfect balance between the setting and the characters.
Conclusion
As illustrated, the process of making an advert is a creative one. Advertisers engage people who understand their products and the use of situational illustrations to pass messages about the quality and features of the products to consumers (Nealon and Giroux 5). Thirst for Beer advert succeeds in achieving the objectives of the client; to create a buzzing advertisement of the beer so as to make people taste it, and come back for more. Ethical considerations and target groups are important in ensuring that adverts do not cross cultural lines and become detrimental to the product. In choosing a beach setting and an elderly cowboy, the advertisers passed a message of ‘qualification to drink’ as opposed to a situation where the setting and character choice used young people fresh from college.
References
"Best Beer Ad Ever Thirsty For Beer". YouTube. N.p., 2016. Web. 15 May 2016.
"Home." Us.pg.com. N.p., 2016. Web. 14 May 2016.
Nealon, Jeffrey T and Susan Searls Giroux. The Theory Toolbox. 2nd ed. Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield, 2012. Print.
Terkan, Remziye. "Importance Of Creative Advertising And Marketing According To University Students ’ Perspective." International Review of Management and Marketing 4.3 (2014): 240. Print.
