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Automotive Brands Served On Ice

Backdrops of scenic ice and snow landscapes for filming automotive commercials, offer great opportunities for car marques to demonstrate responsive driver control and cutting edge technologies for safer travelling, being tested in scenarios of hazardous driving conditions.

1. Citroën Professional E-Range, The Ice Ballet

Advertising Agency: BETC, Paris, France

Chief Creative Officer: Stephane Gibers

Creative Director: Nicholas Bakshi

Copywriter: Nicolas Richard

Art Director: Romain Ducos

Production Company: Zauberberg, Berlin, Germany

VFX and Post Production Studios: b-Epic, Berlin, Germany

Music and Sound Design Studios: GUM, Paris, France

BETC Paris agency’s integrated advertising campaign, in support of Citroën’s new, fully-electric, ë-Berlingo, ë-Jumper, and ë-Jumpy, professional utility vehicle range, is spearheaded by a commercial masterly directed by filmmaker Max Malkin, and filmed on a dense expanse of ice in Helsinki, Finland.

Avoiding stereotypical depictions of doughty workmen in hard hats, the commercial features an agile Citroën utility vehicle owner, performing a highly entertaining ‘ice ballet’, in surrealist harmony with his ë-Berlingo ‘partner’, to the accompanying soundtrack of Joe Cocker’s resonant, “Up Where We Belong” love-song’.

2. Alfa Romeo Stelvio & Giulia, Wicked Game

Advertising Agency: Doner, Detroit, Michigan, USA

Executive Creative Directors: Brad Emmett, Sam Sefton, Kerrin Kramer, and Rob Legato

Brand Leader: Alex Drader

Senior Art Director: Michelle Mussallam

Senior Copyriter: Liam Soren

Production Company: Supply & Demand, Los Angeles, California, USA

Director of Photography: Steve Green

Doner Detroit agency’s 2017 film-scenario, for Alfa Romeo’s luxury, all-wheel-drive vehicles, was brought to entertaining life by filmmaker and director Sean Thonson, with the Stelvio Q4, and Giulia Q4, depicted as performers in an ice ballet, sliding around one another with impressive coordination and precision.

The featured soundtrack is a cover version of American singer, songwriter, and guitarist Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game”, by British film director, screenwriter and composer. Frederick Lloyd, also known as Ursine Vulpine.

3. Citroën C4, Ice-Skating Transformer

Advertising Agency: Euro RSCG, London, UK

Creative Director: Justin Hooper

Agency Producers: Caroline Guillard, and Mana Catford

Post Production and VFX Studios: The Mill, and Automotion, London, UK

Holocaust survivor Henry Orenstein, who passed away in December 2021 at the age of 98, will be famously remembered for his ingenious action figures transformations from cars to robots.

In 1983 he bought his ‘transformer’ concept to American multinational toy manufacturing and entertainment company Hasbro, in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, and history was made.

Worth billions of dollars globally, ’Transformers’ became one of the world’s most successful action figures spanning TV shows, feature films, promotional merchandise, and inspiring commercials, such as Citroën’s CV 4 ‘Alive With Technology’.

Euro RSCG London agency’s 2006, Citroën CV 4 film-scenario, of a transformer ice-skating robot, was brought to spectacular life by the H5 filmmaker collective of directors Antoine Bardou-Jacquet, Ludovic Houplin, and Herve de Crecy.

Filmed on a frozen lake in Canada, with additional filming on a Sheffield ice rink with thirty Vicon MX40 cameras, motion sensors were placed on British speed skater Nicky Gooch, so that every move he made could be recorded for the computer generated robot’s human-like moves.

The featured ‘Walking Away’ soundtrack of the award-winning Clio and Epica commercial, is a Tosca-Disco remix by British electro-funk band, The Egg.

4. Peugeot GTI, The Legend Returns

Advertising Agencies: BETC, Paris, France, and Havas, Dusseldorf, Germany

Chief Creative Officer: Rémi Babinet

Creative Director: Vincent Behaeghel

Creative Team: Marcus Herrmann, Oliver Hilbring, and Stefan Muhl

Agency Producer: Thibault Blacque-Belair

Production Company: WIZZdesign, Paris, France

3D Animation and VFX Studios: Unit Image, Paris, France

The action-packed, 2014 James Bond themed scenario ‘ The Legend Returns’, directed by WIZZdesign ANDY’S filmmakers collective, celebrates the 30th anniversary of the Peugeot 205 GTi launch, with its death-defying scenes, by introducing its 208 GTI successor, in a cinematic chase scenario, with a a rocket launching, combat helicopter.

5. Suzuki Kizashi, Sled

Advertising Agency: Siltanen & Partners, Los Angeles, California USA

Chief creative officer: Rob Siltanen

Creative director: Joe Hemp

Production Company: Boxer Films, Culver City, California, USA

Impressively directed by filmmaker Jim Zoolalian, the classic Super Bowl ‘Suzuki Kizashi Sled’ commercial features a great soundtrack of “Movin’ on up” by American Rapper, 50 Cent.

Filmed in Canada on Alberta’s frozen Spray Lake, the panoramic, arctic landscapes, provide a cinematic backdrop to an entertaining story with an endearing cast of a convivial sled-dog musher and his rap-loving canine companions, in an amusing scenario twist.

6. Nissan Rogue, Winter Warrior

Advertising Agency: TBWA, Toronto, Canada

Art Director: Susie Lee

Copywriter: Jonah Flynn

Agency Producer: Nadya McNeil

Production Company: Sons and Daughters, Toronto, Canada

Director of Photography: Chris Soos

Post Production An VFX Studios: The Mill, Los Angeles, California, USA

Directed by filmmaker Mark Zlbert, Nissan’s seven-seater, all-wheel drive Rogue, comes to the rescue in a city under siege by evil, menacing snowmen, who represent the worst that Canadian weather conditions can offer.

For Canadian motorists, winter can feel like a concerted assault on their mobility, but fortunately there is a ‘Nissan Winter Hero’ that can cut through the snow, and smash through the threatening, zombie-like, snowmen.

The surreal escape from a ‘Canadian Winter War’, is an action packed scenario that makes for entertaining viewing.

7. Mercedes-Benz, Snow Date

Advertising Agency: Merkley+Partners, New York, USA

Chief Creative Officer and Chairman: Andy Hirsch

Group Creative Director and Copywriter: Eddie Van Bloem

Group Creative Director and Art Director: Saks Afridi

Production Company: Biscuit Filmworks, Los Angeles, California, USA

Director of Photography: Simon Duggan

Post Production and VFX Studios: MPC, New York, USA

Sound Designer: Brian Emrich

Audio Production and Music Studios: Heard City, New York, USA

Merkley+Partners agency’s 2016, Mercedes-Benz ‘Snow Date’ film-scenario, was brought to charming life by renowned filmmaker and director Noam Murro, in a scenic commercial featuring a soundtrack of Bob Dylan’s “Make You Feel My Love” by American band Sleeping At Last.

8. KIA Sorento, The Perfect Getaway

Advertising Agency: David&Goliath, Los Angeles, California, USA

Production Company: MJZ, Los Angeles, California, USA

Chief Creative Officer: Colin Jeffery

Group Creative Directors: Steve Yee, and Ben Purcell

Creative Director: John O’Hea

Senior Art Director: Mike Cornell

Senior. Copywriter: Andy Sciamanna

Art Director: Ben Tolbert

Copywriter: Chris Juhas

David&Goliath Los Angeles agency’s ‘Kia Sorento’ film scenario, brought to cinematic life by by renowned filmmaker and director Matthijs Van Heijningen, centres on a producer unpacking a proposal to James Bond actor Pierce Brosnan, to star in a film about the perfect getaway vehicle.

What makes for rewarding viewing, is the action-adventure of driving a Kia Sorento that Pierce Brosnan envisions, will be packed with numerous movie cliché firepower portrayals, amusingly turns out to be an exhilarating fireworks adventure of a romantic nature.