Here is the add if you do not know it.
This is an old subject but a fun one I think: A few years ago Bob Dylan appeared in a Victoria Secret add. There were two main reactions. One: Bob Dylan sold out. This is sometimes followed by an admission that this is at least a fun way to sell out -- from Dylan's point of view it is not hard to see the appeal of being around sexy women. But the second reaction looked from the other direction: what -- you know -- ON EARTH would make Victoria Secret want the aged Dylan in their sexy women underwear commercial?
The answer is, as a memento mori, a reminder of death. Dylan aged dramatically, and looks like a skull. The music is cool, but the juxtaposition of Dylan's face with the bodies of the models suggests -- hey, better look sexy now, because death is coming for you and he might look a lot like Bob Dylan. Carpe Diem.
Is it just me, or does it appear that Dylan is shot via a mirror reflection the whole time? He sings 'I'd give anything to be with you', but the mirror seems to hint that it's a physical impossibility. There's almost a joke going on - that one of them exists in the real and the other is only a reflection. Dylan may literally be the reflection, but certainly seems the more real of the two figures.
ReplyDeleteActally, I think it's just that Dylan's dreary music makes you want to die.
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