Sweet Dreams

Customs are an essential way by which messages can not only be transmitted, but supported; these two videos are not the exception. In Marilyn Manson and Annie Lennox “Sweet dreams”, we see completely different costumes, that carry a similar ideology. In Marilyn Manson’s “Sweet dreams” one see a man with long hair dressed as a woman. Manson is wearing a white wedding dress, but his hair is chaotic and filthy. His face is covered by a white veil. He is also wearing black platform leather boots under the wedding dress. Another costume in which Manson is seen is a light blue tutu, but this tutu is also grimy, and it seems as it is broken. In most of the video Manson appears with tight black leather pants, at one point he is even seen riding a pig is a cowboy costume, while he is completely covered in mud. He also dresses up as medusa, with watches replacing the snake heads. On the other hand Annie Lennox’s wardrobe for her version of sweet dreams is clean cut. Lennox is dressed for most of the video in a black power suit with black gloves. She has short orange hair, and her make-up is very simplistic, and classy. Lennox wanted to represent a powerful male figure, while Manson represented a fragile broken female figure.

Although costumes are a resourced used to help get an idea across, they are not the only way used in videos. Scenery is one of the main ways in which a mood is set. Manson’s “sweet Dreams” portrays a dilapidated home. It almost give the impression of an abandoned asylum. The floor is covered with debris, while the walls are plastered with graffiti. Even as everything is destroyed, Manson seems to be trying to annihilate everything further. In contrast Lennox’s scenery is clean and organized. Lennox appears to be in a conference room of an office, then in the field surrounded by trees and cows. Lennox appears in a boat in the middle of a lake. She also looks as if she was in bed waking up from a dream.

Costumes and scenery come together to give Manson’s and Lennox’s symbolisms a powerful almost intoxicating effect. Both videos use animals to represent society. In Lennox’s video society is represented by cows. They follow mindlessly, while the upper-class rules them from business rooms in an orderly fashion. To do this, the upper-class uses media, they send images to society. Likewise upper class rules in Manson’s representation of “sweet dreams.” But their ruling methods are dirty, and they don’t create progress. Everything is destroyed, and there is a feeling of despair in the air, when he is destroying everything it is as if the middle class wanted to get out of that torment that the upper class has created for them, yet on Lennox’s “sweet dreams” the cows although following blindly, do not seems to be suffering. Although Lennox does want society to open their eyes towards media’s control. This is represented, by the continuous images of opening eyes.

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