In order to better understand and analyze the rhetoric work in multimodal projects, I decided to choose one of the tools, where multimodality is on its nearly maximum. I thought about some interesting fan-videos on YouTube platform, movie clips made by Hollywood celebrities, different the most famous interviewers on YouTube such as James Cordon, Jimmy Fellon, Ellen, and others, MEMES (I really had been thinking to write about my favorite meme about the feminism, which is made with the use of a cartoon of SpongeBob) and many many other interesting stuff flowing through the steppes of the digital media. However, I chose something that I really want to write about by myself. And it is work of rhetoric in the Commercials! I decided to show you my most favorite commercial of all times. It was made by Ridley Scott, you may probably hear about him and his works such as Blade Runner, Alien, The Martian, Prometheus, Gladiator etc. The object of advertisement is a most famous computer of Apple company named "Macintosh", which caught up people's attention in 1984. Steve Jobs was a genius, guru of marketing and making special things, which you are forced to buy by some incomprehensible reasons, even if it is too expensive, and have a lot cheaper substitutes. I like all the products of Apple, but Steve Jobs himself I love more. He always had been doing something which never looked same to other things and used to be hundred times more creative and interesting than other ones. He always used to say that his favorite product from Apple is his project of a Macintosh computer (Jobs wanted to rename it to the Bicycle, but no one liked it (fortunately!)), and it for sure caught everyone's eyes at that times, which is still true even for newer versions, now called Mac. As Steve wanted Macintosh to be something more special than other ones, he did almost everything to make people buy it. Even though the initial aim of the device was its low cost and affordability, Jobs changed these values after entering the project and wanted to make the best computer ever, despite its cost. The product itself came out to be a very unique, but still, expenses were high, as well as its cost on the market. Moreover, even the commercial was very expensive and cost hundred thousands of dollars, but without this advertisement, maybe Macintosh would not so successful as it came out at the end. If you never watched it before, you 100% should do it now.
I personally think that this advertisement is the best thing in the whole story of all commercials. In this 60-second clip Jobs and Scott made a parallel between George Orwell's "1984" and the present time (for that advertisement time). Let me briefly tell about the main idea of Orwell's book. It is a dystopian novel, published in 1949, was the author describes the future of humanity. In his story there is a country where only one ruler exist - Big Brother (who's always watching you) and his party, and all people are under this Big B. Rulers try to make out of the population an army of equal and the same people, who would not have its own opinion, so that no one ever could make a revolution acts, or think that probably they can live differently. In that reality, there are understandings of thoughtcrime and thought police. If you ever used to think bad about the Party, or ever dreamed to live differently, or ever thought about independence, then you are the one who made a thoughtcrime. And if police will catch you (and they for sure will), then you would be deleted (or killed in the words of normal people). So, we came up to the point, that there is a group of people living under the fear and beliefs in a crazy ideology. Oh, one more thing, there is daily Two Minutes Hate, when everyone came at one place near the telescreen, and watch a video of Big B talking about the revolutionizer who was killed, and that no one should do the same. Overall, this book is about the revolution, about the people's independence, right for being a unique and creative, a right to live how they really want, and how they deserve.
So now we can move the commercial video itself. As you can see, the main tool used in this advertisement is a plot of Orwell's novel. This commercial was made to show it on the Super Bowl tournament. The Super Bowl only the best advertisements are able to be broadcasted. The main audience for whom this commercial was addressed is users of computer devices, big companies, and personal users as well, everyone who somehow needs a thinking machine, big calculator, for their work or anything else. The secondary audience is people who can watch this advertisement on TV between some TV shows or news, and tells about it to other people, or make the news or report out of it, and a bunch of other possible things. As it is written in a book Writer/Designer in Chapter 2, page 37-38, the secondary audience is a group of people who somehow benefit from the multimodal text, uses it somewhere (just like me using that ad to make an assignment), or even uses a report wrote by using this text. And another group of audience, it is competitors of Apple, such as IBM, to show that their project is better, that Apple ones are those who are making a breakthrough in the field of technologies and IT sphere.
Now let's try to determine the main purpose of this ad. Big sales? Boasting to IBM (and Lisa producers)? Showing a great mind of a director? Or Steve's? In my opinion, it is everything all together and no one at the same time. Those are real aims, but not the primary ones. By my mind, the main purpose is to intrigue audience, and make sure that they will be interested in a product, that they will like to know what will happen next, what will happen in 24th of January (24th is a date of introducing Macintosh to a world). This commercial had been turned out successful, as a rate of selling were high (higher than Lisa's) and every people remembered that advertisement many times forward. Even per today people watch this video and want to buy this product immediately (like me), just because the video is too good to exist.
Context. I think that every person has her or his own opinion about this clip, just because there are too many ways this commercial can be interpreted. But I will introduce you only to mines. First of all, the idea of Apple making a revolution in a world with its new product that is made to make people's life easier and more comfortable (as any digital device does). The blonde girl, running to the Telescreen at the time of Two Minutes Hate, while all people sitting like zombies (and all looking the same, wear the same grey jackets and baldhead). She is wearing red shorts and a white T-shirt with a picture of Macintosh on it. She is athletic, she is fresh, she is daring, and she is full of belief in her own ideology. At the 1980's the main computer producers used to be IBM company. People knew them, and people trust them, and Apple also knew that, and they realized that their biggest opponent in the fight for consumers attention (and money) is IBM. So, in my mind, The IBM is a Big B, and the coolest girl in that room is Apple, and that girl prefers to believe in Macintosh and ruins Big B's face with all her passion.
However, the most impressive thing in all these 60 seconds for me, was a text at the end. "On January 24th, Apple Computer will introduce Macintosh. And you'll see why 1984 won't be like Nineteen Eighty-Four." While I listen to this voice and this words the goosebumps always start to rise on my body (even if I watched that clip 500 times already). And I used to believe to that voice, and I want to see why 1984 will not be like 1984 (and now I see). A huge breakthrough not only in the technological field but even in the lives of normal people. Apple changed a lot in our world, and Macintosh is one of the pieces of a whole art.
I want to write a couple words about the design choice of a director for this video. First, the ad is made in very dark colors contrasting to the red shorts of a girl (and blonde hair contrasting to a baldheaded man). Also, there are some visuals, which implements the motive of a picture, a dark mood, and negative environment of a society. Moreover, audio effects pass viewers and listeners though that atmosphere and revolutionary mood. I definitely obsessed with a work of Jobs and Scott!
Just look to the next commercial of Apple made in 1985. It is also very cool and has deep meaning (each one can implement the concept of how they want).
27.08.2018
Kamila Smailova