Commodity Fetishism Analysis - Soaps

Written on May 26th, 2023 for Film Theory

A video was also created for this assignment and can be watched here:

Soaps

Siegfried Kramer describes the art of film as a medium with unique functions that are applied to communicate a message to the audience. To construct this: movement, inanimate objects, and revealing compositions thrive those messages through their application. Using this concept, Soaps: a short video created using these applications, was created to demonstrate these functions through close-ups of different soaps, and raw natural audio, and to transmit the message of how diversity is used to promote the same products under commodity fetishism.

Soaps begin with a pair of hands reaching out to lather soap on himself. As the video progresses, this is repeated with four parallel edited compositions of different soap bars and pumps. The video ends as water is heard being turned off, and a reach for a paper towel cuts to black. Techniques used here, such as close-ups, were chosen to grab the audience’s attention to the patterns of similar applications with different types of soaps. It can be observed that despite their uses, the hands resulted in the same conclusion. This was used on par with the similar sound of a water faucet running in the background to trigger the audience's imagination to the conclusion that the actions taken place were of someone washing their hands.

This film was used to represent how diversity has been used as a tool in commercial media to promote a product with a singular specific use. As observed in 2023, companies such as Target and Bud Light attempted to use the LGBT and Black community as a promoting point to sell retail and alcohol. As this backfired for the company's venue, many were under commodity fetishism as they purchased retail and alcohol under different brands. As Kracauer puts it, “Nor do we perceive the familiar. It is not as if we shrank from it, as we do in the case of refuse; we just take it for granted…all these things are part of us like our skin, and because we know them by heart we do not know them with the eye”. Kracauer communicates that society will look at the material for granted and may only purchase it under certain conditions. We are exposed to different items through the lens of associating with different ideologies and agendas to the point where a soap bottle is not just a soap bar, but an allegiance and subscription to anything. This can also be applied to the entertainment industry as media both naturally and forcefully push behaviors around these agendas through their programming without the audience realizing one thing: It’s still a show or movie.

As Kracauer’s concepts in the recording and function of film are still applied today, media can promote concepts such as commodity fetishism to entice viewers to purchase similar items without perception.