F06 :: Feminist Film Studies

I watched an episode of America’s next Top Model (ANTM). ANTM can be categorized as a competition reality show. It was created by Tyra Banks (the supermodel) in 2003. It originally aired on UPN but is currently on at 8pm Wednesday nights on CW (which is a merger between WB and UPN). Tyra is one of three executive producers of the show, a mentor to the girls in the competition, as well as one of the judges of the competition. There are usually about fourteen girls or so that began the competition. Each episode, the girls are taught something new about modeling like how to look sad but sexy or how to walk the runway. By the end of the episode the girls have to use what they learned in individual photo shoots. A panel of judges looks at each photograph and chooses who is strong enough to stay and who should go home. They begin to just rip apart each girl from head to toe making comments like “her nose looks piggy in this shot� or “she is showing no emotion in her eyes.� The panel of judges includes a runway specialist who is male, an old school female model, a male photographer, a male photo director, and Tyra herself, who sits at the judging table completely glamorized (make-up, hair, outfit) as if to say “this is what you should be aspiring to become.� There are twelve writers/directors of this show, so I wonder if the judges debating on camera about who stays and who goes is real. When a model is informed that she is “still in the running to becoming America’s next top model� she is called before Tyra who is standing on a pedestal, looking down on the model and informing her on what she did good or, more often what she needs to do to improve her appearance. The winner of the competition gets a $100,000 modeling contract with Cover Girl and a photo spread in Elle magazine, so of course, the show is sponsored by Cover Girl. I found that this show has a multitude of gazes. There is, of course, the gaze of the photographer, who was male. The gaze of the photographer is paired with that of the photograph director, who is watching every shot taken on a computer as it is happening. The job of the photo director is to tell the model how to switch up her poses and how to connect with the camera and in this show is also a male. These two double as judges and each model is aware of this while they are posing. We are sometimes shown that the other models are looking on to find out how well the posing model is doing and to hear what sort of praises or the lack there of that she receives from both the photographer and the photograph director. The camera sits side be side with the other models as if we too are one of the competing models watching the shoot. A slightly more complex gaze is that of the “main� camera from which we gain our insight into this “reality� show. There is also the gaze of the entire judging panel as well as the models viewing themselves in photographs. This gaze is interesting in that the models are usually shocked at how they look often times indicating that they don’t recognize themselves. This show has really caught on in other countries. Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hungary, Israel, Netherlands, Norway, Philippines, Scandinavia, Thailand, Turkey, and the U.K. all have started their own top model shows, some of which are already on their third season.