"The higher the hair, the closer to God." - Jennifer Nettles, Sugarland.
I am, indeed, quite the fan of big hair. I believe in backcombing. I believe in bobby pins and Bumpits. I also firmly believe in the power of L'Oreal's Elnett Satin hair spray.
What I do not believe in, however, are Cheryl Cole's hair extensions, nor the "sassy" full-of-obvious-sexual-innuendos advert she's done to celebrate Elnett's 50th anniversary.
Cheryl and her impossibly full bouffant are both ambassadors for the brand, and Cheryl's be-dimpled grin has even appeared on a bottle of the pricey, sticky spray. However, the advert, despite being worked on by Rankin, is just ....irritating.
"Spray it." Cheryl breathily commands. "Up do it." Cheryl coyly suggests. And then she squints her eyes a bit, smolders into the camera and says, "Undo it."
Cheryl! You minx!
We're then tantalized with Cheryl's sexy, big-haired silhouette - looking some what like an off-kilter cake pop - and then, suddenly, there she is, her hair half swept up in a '60s style bouffant, clicking a pen like some naughty, impatient librarian.
Next there's some glitter on a drum kit ("Rock it!") a chandelier with an electrical short ("Glam it!"), and then Cheryl proclaims that, apparently, "nothing holds me like it", and we're met with the image of a pair of handcuffs clicking in to place. Wait ...handcuffs? Cheryl, I thought we were talking about hair spray. I'm confused. And slightly aroused. Over hair spray!
Cheryl then says to "keep hold of it!" and dramatically throws on a big jacket that has L'Oreal's iconic slogan "you're worth it" written on the back. The jacket doesn't really fit her, but then again all her own jackets are probably too small to fit an entire slogan on the back. Maybe just a lowercase "c" for "Cheryl". Or "e" for Elnett.
All in all, I'm sure most women would prefer to be sold hair spray by Cheryl Cole in a less titillating way. Elnett is - for the most part - a hair spray for women. Cheryl Cole is routinely targeted to us as someone we should want to be like, not be aroused by. As Rankin himself even put it, "She has all the aspirational qualities that we have come to expect from a L'Oreal woman." Yes, Rankin. Aspriational. Not "fuckable". So why portray her to us as sexy librarian juxtaposed with the image of handcuffs? Despite them both being a spray, Elnett is not Lynx. We just want our hair to stay in place. Not have our hands cuffed, you know, because we're "worth it".