Beauty Standards Within
2021
EXT. – DAY
A black screen.
NARRATOR (V.O.)
Beauty standards seem to be what defines us in this day and age.
MONTAGE:
PEACE PIECE by Bill Evans plays in the background.
Many teenage girls and boys are shopping at popular cosmetic stores, sitting at vanity tables, and at beauty clinics undergoing different procedures. SOFT HUMMING of machinery and CLANKING of glass bottles can be heard faintly as these scenes pass.
Some are pointing out reference pictures as to what they want to get done, some lying on tanning beds, a bright blue UV light shining harshly on their bodies.
NARRATOR (V.O.)
People seem to go to never-ending extents to fulfill their dream appearance.
FADE IN:
2.INT. VANITY TABLE – DAY
Montage of INTERVIEWEE 1 standing in a GARDEN, she has a full face of makeup on and the camera slowly zooms into her eye.
ZOOM OUT:
3.INT. INTERVIEWEE’S BEDROOM VANITY TABLE – DAY
The camera zooms out of her eye and she is now in her room, sitting at the vanity table. She is applying fresh makeup on her face.
SOFT CLINKING OF GLASS is heard as she moves her bottles of skincare and cosmetics around. About a hundred containers of different coloured glass decorate her vanity in her ROOM. The right side is for skincare, and the left side is for her cosmetics.
INT. INTERVIEWEE’S BEDROOM – DAY
NARRATOR (V.O.)
KIT TEOH is a 15-year-old girl currently in the School of the Arts (SOTA)’s dance faculty who has an immense interest in cosmetic products.
B-ROLL:
Shot of the mirror with her reflection in it. She is carefully
selecting products and brushes while applying make-up.
TINKLING PEACEFUL MUSIC plays in the background.
KIT TEOH (V.O)
My collection over here consists of about 74 bottles of different products. I started collecting these products ever since I was 12.
NARRATOR (V.O.)
From a young age, she has been influenced by beauty standards, and today, she wants to share how this has affected her daily life and her interests.
DISSOLVE TO:
4. INT. INTERVIEWEE’S BEDROOM CHAIRS – SUNSET
INTERVIEWER
Can you tell me a bit about yourself?
KIT
Hi, my name is Kit and my hobby is dancing. I love cosmetics and clothes because they make me confident and it’s my way of expressing myself.
B-ROLL of adding highlight to her cheeks in front of the vanity mirror.
CLASSICAL MUSIC MIX #1 plays in the background then stops when the b-roll is over
INTERVIEWER
Could you tell me your views on beauty standards in Singapore?
KIT
Right now, I feel like many youths have a fixed perspective of what beauty is and its features like being skinny, not having acne, having long legs, and having a flat stomach.
INTERVIEWER
Where do you think youths get the idea that this is the beauty standard?
B-ROLL of her scrolling through her Instagram feed, pictures of skinny celebrities in flashy outfits and make-up looks appear.
KIT (V.O)
On social media, there are many celebrities like Kendall Jenner that youths want to be as well as the people we see in real life having the ideal body type.
CUT TO:
A white screen. An animation of an average-sized girl walks onto the screen. She looks at herself in the mirror and starts pulling at her skin as if she wants to shape her body in a different way.
The drawing of the girl slowly starts to change, she gets skinnier, her waist is smaller and she is now taller than before. However, she still does not look satisfied.
KIT (V.O)
These kinds of posts have been appearing on my feed for a very long time and I guess it affected how I see beauty as a whole. Sometimes I find myself liking something only because a skinny person is wearing it or doing it and it’s because I’m so used to seeing it online.
FADE TO:
The white screen fades back to the interviewer’s room, and the interview resumes.
INTERVIEWER
Do you think being influenced by this beauty standard is an avoidable thing?
KIT
If you’re totally cut off from the internet then, obviously. Because in this day and age everyone has a cell phone and if you go on the internet, you’re going to see your version of beauty standards everywhere.
FADE TO:
CLASSICAL MUSIC MIX #1 resumes.
Fast-forward clips of teenagers walking on the streets wearing trendy and flashy outfits. Another fast-forward clip of teenagers at the mall, visiting cosmetic and fashion stores.
B-ROLL of teenagers hanging out (sitting on the same table) and they are all on their phones and on social media. A screen recording of someone scrolling through an Instagram feed.
MUSIC FADES when voiceover starts.
KIT (V.O)
For me, I found that after a while I started taking inspiration from these celebrities, like using their weight loss tips and make-up tips and I feel like this happens to many teenagers as well.
NARRATOR (V.O)
Many youths, because of the heavy use of social media, go through this problem of influence as well. And it has affected their thought process and their own definitions of beauty.
CUT TO :
MUSIC STOPS. The interviewee’s bedroom chairs. The interview resumes.
INTERVIEWER
Do you think wanting to fit into this beauty standard is a good or bad thing?
KIT
I think it’s a good thing. I guess it gives people different versions of what they think is beautiful and ugly so it can give them a goal and at the end of it, they could feel happier.
INTERVIEWER
How do you think your personal life experiences affect how you see yourself?
DEFOCUS OUT:
A black screen.
Pictures start moving across the black screen, pictures of thin ballerinas at the barre, tall girls in stockings, and pointe shoes.
KIT (V.O)
Because I’m in dance and I’ve been doing dance since young, I can tell that there’s this image being pushed onto all dancers that they have to be tall, skinny and they must have fair and clear skin.
FADE OUT:
SAD PIANO MUSIC plays softly in the background as the pictures are moving.
Animation of the girl returns, she is still not satisfied with herself and starts imagining her dream appearance. Thought bubbles appear near her head filled with drawings of girls with clear skin, toned muscles, and slim thighs.
KIT (V.O)
These personal experiences kind of affected my own beauty standards because after a while I started to think that I have to look that way also.
PIANO MUSIC STOPS.
FADE IN:
Interviewee’s bedroom chairs, the interview resumes.
INTERVIEWER
How do you think these beauty standards affect your mental health?
B-ROLL pictures of weighing scales, mirrors, cosmetics, and videos of different teenagers standing in front of mirrors staring at themselves or standing on weighing scales take turns to flash across the screen.
KIT (V.O)
I guess because, on social media, I follow many influencers who have this “ideal body type” and sometimes it makes me really sad because I know that I can’t look like that. But sometimes even though it’s hard, I know that I have to learn to accept myself because I’m beautiful in my own way.
NARRATOR (V.O)
Many teenagers like Kit struggle with their self-image as they juggle between societal expectations and their own.
FADE OUT:
The interviewee’s bedroom fades out, a black screen takes its place.
KIT (V.O)
I think a lot of my friends and I struggle with beauty standards and especially because I’m very active on social media, every time I see a celebrity like that I’ll just feel kinda sad.
The black screen transitions to pictures, “before” and “after pandemic” comparisons fade in and out of the screen. The people in these comparisons are skinnier, fitter, and look happier than before.
KIT (V.O)
Like last time during covid, it was a trend to have an “after-pandemic glow up” which was full of people becoming skinnier and fitter through indoor exercise so obviously, I tried it and it didn’t work out and that just made me feel worse about myself. So I guess sometimes even though I’m not very happy about myself I just have to accept that this is who I am.
NARRATOR (V.O)
Many people have different opinions of what beauty is. There are some who follow beauty standards, and some who disagree with them.
5. FADE IN:
Ext. LIBRARY COOL STUFF ZONE – DAY
There are many cushioned chairs scattered around the “cool stuff zone”, an area in the library where students can attend lectures in comfort.
MONTAGE:
Students are typing on their computers, taking notes, and talking to friends.
NARRATOR (V.O)
In a school as large as SOTA, there are sure to be many different types of beauty standards and influences across the levels. A year 3 student, Andrei Rasmussen, shares his views on beauty standards.
ANDREI
I think that beauty standards are really damaging to society. I think they’re a big issue because they show a false idea of what the human body should be looking like.
INTERVIEWER
What do you think the ideal youth beauty standards are?
FADE OUT:
TIME LAPSES of people on the streets. They walk past the camera wearing different clothes and different types of makeup, they also look physically different from each other.
ANDREI (V.O)
I think the beauty standards for youths our age are very contradictory. For example, if a female happens to be muscular and a male, feminine, these people are immediately bad-mouthed behind their backs.
FADE TO:
SAD PIANO MUSIC plays in the background while the interview resumes.
6. INT. LIBRARY COOL STUFF ZONE CHAIRS-DAY
INTERVIEWER
What makes you think this way about beauty standards?
B-ROLL of male dancers at the barre and on pointe, they are all buff and tall and they are dancing perfectly in sync.
ANDREI (V.O)
I think because I’m a dancer too, I see these stereotypes being forced onto male dancers like they have to be adequately buff, they can’t be too skinny and they must have long legs and I found myself thinking that this standard was just so unfair. Why can’t people just look the way they were born to?
PIANO MUSIC CONTINUES.
FADE TO:
B-ROLL of male dancers fades to a B-ROLL of teenagers sitting at different tables in the cafeteria. The camera passes by them acting from someone’s point of view as everyone around the camera stares at it and starts whispering to each other.
ANDREI
I am constantly surrounded by people who sexualise others and criticise people when they don’t fit into their standards. Hearing this gave me a completely different perspective of beauty because the things they were saying were so unfair.
INTERVIEWER
Could you list some examples of where you think these beauty standards come from?
DEFOCUS OUT:
B-ROLL screen recordings of a phone scrolling through Tik Tok.
It is filled with people of very fit body types.
ANDREI (V.O)
So on Tik Tok, there are many influencers whose content is solely based on their bodies and because they fit into the “beauty standard”, they get so much attention and everyone loves them because of it.
SAD PIANO MUSIC fades, replaced with PIANO MUSIC of a slightly happier tone. It plays softly in the background.
FADE TO:
B-ROLL of screen recording fades to white and goes back to the library where the interview resumes.
INTERVIEWER
Many youths your age have a lot of trouble with their self-image because of beauty standards. What would you say to them if you had a chance?
ANDREI
I would tell them to stop worrying about beauty standards because “beauty” has different meanings for everyone and we shouldn’t try to fit into a standard that other people make for us that probably isn’t even meant for us.
FADE OUT:
Black screen. HAPPY PIANO MUSIC gets louder.
NARRATOR (V.O)
Beauty standards are what people use to define themselves in this day and age. But maybe it isn’t as important as we think.
Captions appear in white on the black screen as the narrator speaks.
NARRATOR (V.O)
These standards are all about appearance but that’s not what’s important. Self-worth, confidence, inner beauty, and kindness is what we should be searching for, instead of trivial things like being slimmer.
B-ROLL pictures from previously combine together and flash along the screen at times 2 speed. They get faster and faster and finally stop on a white screen with the words ‘beauty standards’ on it.
NARRATOR (V.O)
Going after these beauty standards might make us happy for now, but that search for beauty is never-ending, and we should stop making things even harder for ourselves by reaching an unattainable goal.
The white screen shows the word ‘standards’ is then canceled with a line and replaced with ‘within’.
The white screen slowly fades to black, with the words ‘beauty within in white still on the screen.
-End-