I came across some images for a new Lancome L’Absolu Rouge lipstick that perked me up. I don’t use much from Lancome these days, but they’re a major brand and player in the market and with Lisa Eldridge at their creative helm in recent times, it’s interested me to keep abreast of what’s going on, even if I don’t actually use any of them.
But interest in new lipstick aside, I found the promo images a little disturbing. Here’s one of them and you can find them online if you look. I found it interesting however, that the promo images aren’t as heavily promoted as they usually are. With the faces they are using, I’m surprised. Or perhaps not.
That is Penelope Cruz, gorgeous lady and a beautiful face for the brand. The lipstick she’s wearing is similarly gorgeous… as is her coat. But hello, why is she naked?!
I’m afraid that’s all I could see when I saw the images – why were the models naked … in an ad for lipstick?!
Now, I’m no prude. I get that sex sells, and while I’m not for women being objectified, I understand how it works in advertising and in appealing to the human psyche.
But if it’s an ad for a lipstick, primarily targeted at women, I don’t quite see the co-relation between the semi-nudity of the female model and the product or target audience. What exactly are they getting at? That you’d be so comfortable with just the lipstick on you will eschew wearing clothes? It might work, except you’d get arrested for indecent behaviour… unless you live in a nudist colony.
I’m not sure either how the ad portrays the ultra-feminine appearance the product purports to target. If you can see how it does, please let me know, because I don’t get it. The image I’m getting is that of a post-coital smoke, complete with tousled hair and general state of undress.
I’m not even going to go near the physical impossibility of Penelope Cruz’s pose, or the impossible length of her limbs that can only be achieved by way of Photoshop. Or Lily Collins’ strange left hand sneaking out of her left breast like The Hand in Addam’s Family.
I love the look of the lipsticks. I love that gorgeous pink on Lily Collins and that sensual red on Penelope Cruz. I love how their makeup looks simple yet amazingly chic. On its own, I’d have LOVED to check out these new lipsticks.
I don’t like very much from Lancome these days, but I did enjoy using the L’Absolu Rouge lipsticks – they’re creamy and pigmented and all sorts of wonderful. I have no doubt that the expertise of Lisa Eldridge would only make the colours brighter, more vibrant and more attractive. I’d love to check them out.
I just hate how they’ve chosen to sell it because the ad turns me right off the product AND the brand. So much for empowering women, what this ad shows me is that for a brand like Lancome who could have done so much more, they’ve chosen to objectify women to other women.
Perhaps I’m just not getting it. I’d probably be exiled in their black books forever for discussing this, but really, I can’t see how I, as a woman, am compelled to buy a lipstick modelled by a beautiful, practically naked woman.
UPDATE: I wrote this about a month ago and left it to rot in my draft folder, unsure if I would publish it. However, I was walking around a local department store here in Malaysia just a few days ago, when I saw the Lancome counter and I did a double take to snap this picture and knew I’d hit the publish button.
Either Lancome shot 2 different ads – one where they are clothed and another where they aren’t, or there’s some crazy photoshop going on. There is, in any event, some awful photoshop. That arm angle is an impossibility, and the Photoshoppers should note that a LEFT hand in that position has its thumb facing AWAY from the face. DUH! 😛
This hatchet job told me that Lancome recognises the impropriety of their ad campaign, and this is their way of mitigating it. There was no way the original ad would have been allowed to run in a conservative country like Malaysia is, and for that I’m glad.
I feel the whole ad campaign to be quite dumb, if you ask me. Penelope Cruz could have been shot in a much more beautiful dress, instead of having a red sweater top superimposed on. Seriously, Lancome. Seriously?!
Do you get it? Does the original ad image draw you to the lipstick?
Answers on a postcard… or better yet, in the comment box below LOL! 😀
Paris B
Nope. Nope nope nope. No way.
I liked their previous campaigns which had that Parisienne chic vibe going on. Now that was very nice.
Naked (celebrity) ladies in a coat? No thanks. Also, now that you mentioned it, that hand pose looks very painful, even if it’s possible. How are you supposed to apply lipstick like that?! And what is her other hand doing?! LOL
Maybe they got inspired after a trip to some seedy Parisian brothel, who knows man! LOL! I’ve seen some bad photoshop jobs done but this really takes the cake. It’s no wonder we don’t see this ad a lot around. They must be too embarrassed to put it up
So check the hand position in the bottom with the one above… it’s the right arm bent awkwardly and cut off. It’s terrible either way. Glad she’s wearing clothes though…
Yep, I was relieved that she was clothed but the person doing the photoshop turned her right arm into her left. Magic! 😀
no they didnt. check the first (bigger) picture!! its the same and you see both hands. her arms are crossed, thats why you might think its her left arm, but if you know the other picture why would you think its the other arm?
i think its a campaign to raise awareness to breast cancer. (at least i saw a similar picture with some text- not ad at all- and there was a girl posing in similar colours, under a coat like that but naked, touching her breast (which again IS covered by the coat and her hand anyway..) i think its not provocing, but ok, i grew up in europe, we have worse
Penelope had one serious hand twisting action going in the ad lol. But when I check back at the full photo, it is her right hand. Just that the photo was cropped in the lightbox hence the weird pose. Haven’t anyone in Lancome notice that awkward hand pose??
Apparently not! I don’t know who’s more to blame – the person who did the hatchet photoshop job, or the approving person who didn’t notice that a left hand doesn’t look like a right LOL!
Ugh! Thank you for bringing this up! I saw the “naked” ad and thought….”things that make you go hmmm…”!
I am so put off by the fact that that despite the strides women are making in the industry, THIS is still what advertisers fall back on. If anything, that nakedness takes away from the focus being on the lip color!
And the local version of this has given me a headache looking at the angles, granted she is wearing a top but surely the person who ok-ed this image must be cross eyed! For the angle that she is holding her arm, I need to see a thumb or my brain will fry!
That’s precisely how I felt when I saw it! Coming from a brand like Lancome, who usually pushes a more elegant vibe, this came as a surprise. Even more surprising when its parent company L’Oreal proclaims that they celebrate women achievements. I’m just surprised someone in the company thought this was OK. I actually blame the person who approved the final copy for the local ad – the photoshopper was bad, but someone still had to sign off on it!
I just have to chime in.
I was having such a monotonous day reading contracts and then lunch time came and this post…
The office was shocked with the loud burst of laughter from the corner room i can tell yah.
Lancome really has not learnt their lesson. I thought that after the Julia Roberts Photoshop embarrassment, Photoshop would have been banned from the Lancome office premises. But noooooOOo… out it comes again. Just goes to show that Photoshop is such an instrumental tool to sell their products, which makes me think…are Lancome products really worth the money since Photoshop and similar apps are just not part of my ‘get ready’ routine in the morning- just some cream and make up.
The continuous increase in product prices is something else.
I used to enjoy Lancome everything (skin care, make up , perfume and facial) I stopped using Lancome products and now have a bit left of the perfume to finish off, which is such a shame because my mom swears by it and I was sold just because mom enjoyed her Lancome products. Not anymore.
LOL Happy to have brightened up your monotonous day! 😀 I started out using some Lancome products too. They made this cream called the Primordiale night cream that I swear was amazing stuff. Then they discontinued it. I never found anything else to enjoy using from the brand and soon drifted away. Even the makeup has been uninspired in recent times. With all the competition coming in from the other brands, big and small, I’d say they have to buck up or be left behind, wallowing in bad photoshop.
You’re always spot on!
Haha thanks Amalia 🙂
Oh they sell lipstick. Ooh.
They got the right target audience there! LOL! 😉
Honestly, I have not looked at Lancome for a long time! I still watch Lisa’s videos, but there’s something about the way Lancome carries itself… I don’t know… something doesn’t sit right with me, and I don’t know what! I do love their powder foundation though. And I like their lipstick too. Just not the ad :-/
I think Lancome is confused LOL When they signed on Emma Watson and then took a very young stance (the way EL is now doing with Kendall Jenner) I backed away, and it would seem, so have others. So, I think they are now confused – can’t appeal to the older ladies who have found other brands more suitable and can’t appeal to the young, who can’t afford it anyway! I haven’t looked at anything Lancome for a while. Pity the one time I did, I had to come across THIS! LOL
Both the ad agency and Lancome have big problem.
In a nutshell! LOL! I’m just surprised no one noticed it enough to bring it up.
It reminds that article from Vice that pulls the words out of my mouth regarding softcore pornexploitation of women:
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/why-cant-women-buy-themselves-underwear
I found the ad for Agent Provocateur directed by Penelope Cruz herself very creepy.
Not empowering or inspiring at all, nor is that Lancome ad.
Although the color of her coat is a lovely shade of red, it puts me off from buying that lipstick…
That was good reading, thank you for the link! I loved the colours used, but the way the ad was targeted put me off so much I don’t even want to look at their lipstick now 😛
Definitely not the kind of ad campaign that draws me in! I wonder what they were thinking. I find their models safe but boring anyway – except for Lupita!
Lancome doesn’t interest me much although once they had a gloss that I thought was beautiful – of course discontinued.
I hear good things about their mascara, but Japanese drugstore mascaras work for me so I won’t spend that much on a mascara 🙂
Oh that’s true about Lupita but I haven’t seen her in any new campaigns have you? Lancome used to make some nice stuff. Lovely lipstick and a liquid lipstick (I can’t remember the name now) and there was this eyeshadow that was gorgeous, as well as their blush. I fell out of love with their foundation after they made them too yellow for Asian skin, and then they did away with one of my favourite night creams. Nothing else suited me much anymore. I guess we’ve just outgrown the brand! Oh and their mascara. I have to agree it’s good but I also agree with you that when you have Japanese mascara on hand, who needs high end brands?!
I wasn’t aware of this print ad campaign but now that you’ve shared it here…gosh! It’s painful just by looking at Cruz’s badly photo-shopped left hand! Wait, her right hand I mean. Or it is left? See, I’m confused already, LOL!
Call me prudish but personally, I’m tired of all this notion of nudity equals female empowerment. If it’s a lingerie ad then it makes sense. But a lipstick ad? May I suggest Natalie Portman for DIOR Rouge lipstick ad; red lips, pretty Natalie, closed-up.
I’m actually surprised that despite the big names, I’m not seeing these ads anywhere online or in print. Well, in print locally it’ll be censored won’t it? But I think that just tells us there’s something wrong with their campaign. Someone should be shot 😛 Actually, I don’t get sexy ads for lingerie as well. Who are they directed at? Men? or Women? 😛 Ooh and yes I like the Dior ads too – straight makeup – no fuss
They’re selling ice to the wrong eskimos. 😛 Like Hanna said, nudity in a lingerie ad? Sure why not? In a lipstick ad? Am I supposed to look at the lips or the exposed parts of the body here? *roll eyes*
I don’t even know what Lancome is getting at to be honest. Perhaps this is why this ad isn’t being widely circulated? I’m actually curious coz I hardly see it!
It’s high time women started voicing their opinions about how so many of these cosmetic companies actually insult their own customers via sexist ads like the ones shown here and by naming their makeup colors with sex-charged and “bad girl” names. I’ve already contacted Lancôme as well as other companies and I’m sure others have as well. If you feel the same, please let your voice be heard.
I thought I’m the only one who felt she is naked. Felt so irritated by it every time it appeared as sponsored post in my Facebook timeline. Seriously it can be done more tastefully to reflect the brand image.
Locally, the ads are all superimposed with a top, so she doesn’t look naked. I didn’t know there were online ads that show the actual pic. Maybe I’m just not following the right people on Facebook? Haha! But yeah, poor taste. Don’t know what’s up with Lancome but this is not something I really want to see from what used to be such an elegant brand!
I have a rare genetic disorder where my hands CAN contort in all kinds of painful yet flexible positions.(ehlers danlos syndrome), so with this defect its possible to do, BUT I hardly think lancome is attempting to appeal to a niche market of women or men with faulty collagen,who want to look amazing while being in agonizing pain “All my joints dislocate today and it hurts to have clothing touch my skin,but boy my lips look good ” Maybe THAT is why the partial nuditity! ;)Anyone know if loreal’s old penelope red has a similar Shade in lancome or loreal. ? It looked great on my Spanish -“scottish skin. Thanks!
Oh dear, I’m sorry to hear of your painful ability to contort yourself, but I had to laugh at your humour 😀 I’m afraid I’m not certain about the L’Oreal version, being unfamiliar with it, but I hope you find a similar one 🙂