Hilarious and surreal Mercedes-Benz film follows a manic search to define luxury

With our leftovers lunches and biro-stained jeans, we don’t feel overly confident as experts in “modern luxury.” One man who is, however, is Johannes Torpe, creative director of slick Danish brand Bang & Olufsen. A hilarious and rather surreal new short directed by Bo Mirosseni plays on Johannes’ luxury savvy to rather comical effect, pitting him as a sort of cool saving grace for a less-than-cool entrepreneur frantically trying to prepare a speech for the International Luxury Conference.

Johannes’ knowing demeanour acts as a counterpoint to the growing madness we see in our writers-block-struck protagonist, Marco, who throughout the film descends gradually into deeper mania. As he struggles to write his speech, his mind is besieged by a tatty marching band, sounding the drum-beat for the march towards his impending embarrassment at the conference. When he really starts to lose it, his reveries lead him to imagine himself upon a gloriously sun drenched, deserted beach; the waves eroding the sand of his far less beautiful reality.

Bo jokes that the spiralling mania is in part based on himself. “Maybe [the character does that] because I am slowly becoming a maniac!” he says. “I’ve always found it very fascinating to watch people that are either under pressure to do something that is a complete 180 for them.”

He adds: “Humans in general are so damn fascinating….when someone seemingly so normal can become so crazy, well, I don’t know, that’s just really interesting to me – from a psychological and cinematic perspective.”

Veering from these dramatic imaginings, the narrative hinges on the final scene, where we leave behind Marco’s lunatic imaginings and venture into something rather more serene – a Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG car, to be precise. It’s in these sumptuous surrounds that Marco gets his resolution – the unspoken but crystal clear definition of “modern luxury” that comes from his ride, and from its driver Johannes.

This film is the second in Mercedes Benz’s Fashion Creatives Series, which brings different creatives together to collaborate on unique shorts. Keep your eyes peeled for when more of the films are released next year. For more information, visit the Mercedes-Benz page.