Television Style » Chapter 3: The Persuasive Power of Style

Chapter 3: The Persuasive Power of Style

[View Slideshow]

3.01 Noxzema Medicated Shave relies on metaphoric sex for its impact.

Fig 3.01

3.02 “Take it off. Take it all off.”

Fig 3.02

3.03 Strike: Director Sergei Eisenstein intercuts a bull being slaughtered with...

Fig 3.03

...workers being attacked by police—generating a visual metaphor of workers = cattle.

Fig 3.04

3.05 The song, “I Feel Free,” accompanies a girl twirling in a water sprinkler...

Fig 3.05

...a Hyundai car driving down the road...

Fig 3.06

...and mountain climbers on a summit.

Fig 3.07

3.08 A rave in the woods to the music of Basement Jaxx...

Fig 3.08

...finds a young man caught up in the music...

Fig 3.09

...which we are meant to associate with the blissful pleasure of Coca-Cola products: “Bliss...comes from...within. Enjoy.”

Fig 3.10

3.11 Ad man Rosser Reeves invented the “tension headache”...

Fig 3.11

...which his client, Anacin—and only Anacin—could remedy.

Fig 3.12

3.13 Actor Anna Karina gazes at the camera in Vivre Sa Vie, shattering the fourth wall.

Fig 3.13

3.14 Vivre Sa Vie: Voyeurism denied? Director Jean-Luc Godard shoots a nude figure through a doorway.

Fig 3.14

3.15 A client of the Hair Club looks directly at the camera as he presents his testimonial.

Fig 3.15

3.16 Actors speak to the camera as if they were the actual creators of Bartles & Jaymes wine coolers.

Fig 3.16

3.17 Non-human figures such as the Speedy Alka-Seltzer often pitch products.

Fig 3.17

3.18 Letterboxing reshapes the frame of a MicroStrategy commercial...

Fig 3.18

...and allows it to create an imbalanced composition with a woman in focus on the edge of the frame and a man, in the center of the image, out of focus.

Fig 3.19

3.20 WorldCom: An excessively low and wide-angle shot of a man on a scooter.

Fig 3.20

3.21 A wide-angle lens distorts the hood of an Infiniti car.

Fig 3.21