Wednesday, 23 October 2013

Voyeurism

Voyeurism is an idea that comes from Freud. It has been used in Media Studies a lot, particularly in explaining the gendered pleasure of cinema. It is basically the idea of looking in order to gain sexual pleasure. It is basically from male pleasure. Usually you will get a music video with a girl or a couple of girls who dance, grind and perform sexual moves in order to entertain the males.
A couple of examples of these include Beyonce's 'Crazy in Love' and  User's 'Love in this Club'.


 
In 'Crazy in Love' Beyonce is shown in an extremely sexual way in order to attract the male gaze. At 0:21 she is walking towards the audience with slow motions put in which show her hair flying about and because she is in a tight top her boobs are underlined as well as her legs because she is wearing really revealing shorts.
Also at 0:31 she gets down on the floor and starts to dance and do weird stuff. For example where she twists and turns and puts her legs up in the air attracts the male gaze to her long, strong legs. At 0:35 this continues to develop the attraction of the male gaze as she actually lies down and grinds which shows off her figure. Finally at 0:37 there is a mid close-up on the bum. At this point she is moving it side to side and this is where the male gaze is captured fully.


Similarly in this video 'Love in this Club' at 0:43 similarly there is a woman standing in front of Usher in a tight dress underlining her boobs. Once again a woman dressed in this way will attract the male attention. At 0:47 the woman says 'your every desire' she whispers it into Usher's ear and does it in a bit of a sexual way. From 1:46 - 1:50 the camera doesn't focus on the woman's face but it focuses on her boobs and her flat stomach and then we see her approach Usher in a sexual way. The way she works herself around him by capturing him so he can not leave. Finally, at 1:52 with her mouth she grabs Usher's necklace and grinds around him. Yet again the male gaze has been captured.

No comments:

Post a Comment