The video opened with the shot of the rear of a woman walking around her house in her underwear before running her finger down her cleavage and moving her hand in a suggestive way over her hip and thigh. Later scenes showed a close-up of her bottom and her putting her shirt on while in her bra.
The Advertising Standards Authority, the UK’s regulator for all forms of advertisement, received eight complaints that the advert was offensive and sexually objectified women. The ASA banned the video for containing “sexually suggestive” scenes that were “likely to cause serious offence to some viewers.”
The advert was for a phone by a little-known brand, Kazam. The Tornado 348 claims to be “the world’s thinnest phone” although many were quick to point out that this claim is not true. That title goes to the Oppo R5 at just 4.85mm wide.
The ASA noted how “much of the ad was focused entirely on the actor in her underwear.” “Suggestive” music and voice-over was also employed and the regulator agreed that the scenes were irrelevant to the product they were supposed to be advertising.
Kazam, defending, argued that the video was based around an idea that the phone was so slim that an owner could forget that it was in their shirt pocket. The phone was left in the woman’s shirt that she ironed.
The woman supposedly did not realize that she had ironed her phone with her shirt. It is questionable whether that could ever be a good selling point for a product anyway.
Although Kazam had ensured that it would not be broadcast during programs designed for young children, the ASA has now issued a blanket ban on showing the advert owing to the implications of the objectification of women.
