Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Dreamworlds 3: Why Portrayls in Music Videos Matter

Sut Jhallys Dreamworlds represents the fantasy world of the music video and its effects on popular culture, and its representations of masculinity and femininity. The film is almost whole shot of intercutting scenes from various music videos, however these are just the visual intercutting the songs that are so catchy are not played only Jhallys commentary on the images. Jhally makes the point that the stories being told by this fantasy dreamworld are not diverse, they are the fantasy world of heterosexual male fantasy. In this world women “know their place”, are always ready for sexual escapades and are highly allergic to any form of clothing. The film at first does nothing as most of the images are so common that we do nto notice them as unusual. However as time goes on and we are being informed of the message behind the images and what the really mean, you as a viewer gian this sense of discomfort. In some ways as a viewer I was able to see these images for what they really were for the first time. Jhally also addresses that while women are portrayed as passive sexual beings men are played as overaggressive abusive characters who exude power.
Jhally addresses the fact that while some objectification of bodies is alright it is not good when the only way that women can be presented in music videos is through this highly sexualized lens. He makes the point that while these videos do not cause the problem they do create an environment for problems such as attacks/abuse against women is more acceptable. One of the most moving segments is when Jhally shows footage of a riot during which several women were assaulted, the footage is then intermixed/intercut with mainstream music video and with the mainstream song played over it. The riot footage of the women being attacked and the club scene footage are almost indistinguishable.

No comments:

Post a Comment