It has been quite a couple of weeks for Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO. First, it retained the £20m Lotto ad account against stiff competition. Then it snared the £13m Pizza Hut business and topped it off last week with the £15m Capital One account.


Now the agency has done a very fine ad for its new Mercedes client. It stars the actor Josh Brolin and it is as slick as bottle of Dove body lotion. It is all about "presence" and, never mind the car, the ad itself has presence in shovel-loads.

Presence, apparently, is "not about adolescent, ostentatious display – it should be something effortless". And though this ad is far from effortless, it does have a wonderful languid, cool feel.

There is not really much to tell about what happens in the ad. It is a string of noir-ish images (late night streets, roaming dogs, glimpsed cars) knitted together by Brolin's throaty monologue, wonderfully written by AMV's Tim Riley.

It is all stunningly directed by Johnny Green, through Knucklehead productions. If this was a two-hour movie, I'd want to watch it. As it is, it is 30 seconds of beauty.