“I scream for you”
Today I have some short notice on product communication and post modern message style.
Commercial for Halo Top Ice Cream (2017) by Mike Diva
By depicting a surgery white Spartan but meticulously decorated room, accommodating an old women being force-fed with ice cream by a robot, Mike Dahlquist, also known as “Mike Diva”, introduces consumer his new commercial for Halo Top Ice Cream. This oppressive and at the same time intriguing mise-en-scène is strategically embellished with a lyrics, almost scientifically manipulated by means of suprasegmental phonemic in the form of juncture “I scream for you/I scream for me/I scream for someone to set me free”, reaching the ears as “Ice cream for you/Ice cream for me/Ice cream for someone to set me free”.
Seeing as a whole, the content creates a genuine Kafkaesque atmosphere in the beholder’s mind. You might never again desire an ice cream, recalling the plot of the commercial, but you will definitely never forget what you just have seen. The product is locked within the feeling, creating an experience based on cognitive dissonance.
The terrifying scenario conceives a certain grade of nervous tension, when the beholder has hard time to believe that this is a commercial for an ice cream brand, hovering between resistance to leave and temptation to continue watching. At that point the irony enters into the cultural context as a negation of the latter – explicitly stated meaning – which is difficult to comprehend. In the context, the irony faces with cultural constraints and relies on the details to ensure and to guide the interpretation of the potential meaning and stipulations of relations that the brand seeks to establish around their product.
The postmodern marketing communication appears to be built on a creative strategy, which seems to establish a new benchmark for cultural communication. Is it a ‘zeitgeist moment’ of the democratised marketing, new communication appeal or a postmodern message style?
Commercial for Halo Top Ice Cream (2017) by Mike Diva
Mike Dahlquist, also known as “Mike Diva”
