The Boddingtons and the John Smiths adverts

Both the Boddingtons advert and the John Smiths advert were shown on ITV during the breaks and between television programmes. As a class, we viewed it during the break of the champions league semi-final football match between Chelsea and Monaco. I think this was purposely shown at this time as typically people who would be watching the football would predominantly be male, which would be the perfect target audience as mainly men aged between 18-50 would probably drink it.

The Boddingtons advert is promoting Boddingtons beer, and so its intended audience would be adults. The opening scene of the advert is set in a pub to start. It suggests that all men are alcoholics and are rather dumb and would go to any extent for a pint. This is implied in the advert when the men try in many various ways to smuggle their pints out of the pub but fail to do so three times before they actually succeed in smuggling out a measly half pint, but when they get back home their girlfriends are already sitting at the table with their pints of Boddingtons. There was Boddingtons in the house all along, in a new draught barrel in the locked fridge.

The fact that the men are wearing suits gives the impression that they are quite affluent. The club that the scenes are set in is a very exclusive pub, this is shown by the presence of the bouncers and the expensive cor. This is also conveyed through the men and the clothes they wear. They are not dressed casually, they are wearing smart suits and have a gangster like appearance. Although the men seem , when the first man is caught trying to smuggle the pints out in his coat pockets, they look/turn away as if they are ashamed or don’t know him. It is like they are turning their back on him because they care more about themselves and their reputations, and don’t even have the courage to support their friends, indicating that men are selfish, inconsiderate and cowards.

The mise-en-scene is that of a typical British gangster film, this is used to attract the audience. The camera is used to create episodes of the advert, it shows them trying to smuggle out the beer and failing, and it cuts straight to the following scenes of them trying in other ways. The camera uses close up shots every time to try and keep the audience focused as it is very fast moving from scene to scene, which can be a little hard to follow and can be rather confusing. At each attempt to smuggle the beer out of the pub they were outwitted by the bouncers, eventually, managing to smuggle just half a pint between the four of them they arrived home to find their girlfriends already had the beer and they had been outsmarted yet again!

The John Smiths advert is promoting John Smiths beer, and so this adverts’ intended audience would also be adults. This advert is set in a pub, and suggests that men are dumb, insensitive and inconsiderate. This is portrayed as an overweight, middle aged man is sitting in a curry house having a drink with his friends and when the babysitter calls on the mobile phone. He then speaks to his daughter on the phone, and she apparently says there are monsters in the wardrobe, and he replies ‘Don’t be silly there’s no such thing as wardrobe monsters, it’s the burglars breaking through the windows you’ve got to be worried about!’ He then calmly calls an order to the waiter, takes a sip of this drink and doesn’t even realize doesn’t even realise that what he has done and said is wrong, even when he sees his friends looking at him with shocked and disgusted expressions, as he confusedly replies ‘What?’

Many years ago men would have been very highly respected as head of the family, they would go to work to earn money to look after them, leaving his wife at home to manage the housework and care for the children. Now, in the modern world our respect for men is deteriorating, the way they are now represented in many adverts like those above, as dumb, insensitive, inconsiderate alcoholics. This really earns them no respect at all. They were respected for what they did for the family, for being in control as head of the family, but now in most family households women go to work as well as look after the family at home, although men are usually predominantly the main wage earners and do some things around the house to help. Men are having to participate more around the house and with the family. However men don’t like to do this as they feel that it is making them lose their macho image they once had and would like to maintain.

Humour is created in the adverts by the way in which the men in the Boddingtons’s advert are so foolish, and the ways in which they try smuggling the beer out of the pub and by the stupidity shown when their girlfriends are sitting round the table at home with the beer, also by the insensitive and foolish things the man in the John Smiths advert said to his daughter about burglars. This is used to make the audience laugh, attracting them to the advert.

These adverts are suggesting that men are alcoholics and this isn’t just suggested in the adverts, as statistics show that the number of men aged 25-64 dying from chronic liver disease has increased by 5 times since 1970, the main cause being alcohol misuse, therefore also showing the decline of respect for men and the decline of control they have for themselves and the family. In 1980 the average man weighed 74 kilograms and 6% of the male population were obese, this has dramatically increased to 15% of the male population being obese today in 2004. This is portrayed in the John Smiths advert as a typical, common, overweight British man in a curry house having a pint.