We open on a man playing the cello in his livingroom; his wife is nearby. However, she’s in a bathing suit and he’s in what appear to be swimming trunks.
Next we’re taken to another household where a young boy is flying his remote control-operated model airplane. Doing this indoors would normally elicit objections from a parent. But we see that the house has no roof as the plane flies overhead in the wild blue yonder.
A local convenience store is also sans a roof. Shoppers are milling about in the aisles–a scene which we witness courtesy of an aerial shot.
An aerial view of another roofless house shows us a man lying down in bed, while someone else is showering in the bathroom.
Meanwhile, winding its way through neighborhood roads is a Peugeot 307 Coupe Cabriolet (CC), which too enjoys life with the top down. There’s nothing quite like feeling the wind in your hair and sunshine on your shoulders–that is, until it rains.
Ominous dark clouds foreshadow the deluge that’s about to come. For the Peugeot occupants, the suddenly wet conditions present no problem since the car comes with a retractable roof. At the sign of inclement weather, the vehicle’s roof comes down at the touch of a button.
However, the homes–and the convenience mart we saw–aren’t so lucky. The man in bed is soaked, as are the cello player, et al. These wet folks are scrambling to put the roofs back onto their homes–the roofs laying in their backyards. In the case of the convenience store, the roof is in the parking lot. The sight of trying to put a roof back onto a building in the pouring rain is strangely comical, particularly when juxtaposed with the sight of a car roof easily falling back into place, providing its occupants with cover–and when the sun returns, the roof being pulled back so that driver and passengers can again catch some rays.
Titled “Roofs,” the spot was directed by Frederic Planchon of Irene, Paris, for BETC Euro RSCG, Paris. A town of roofless buildings was created for the ad; the neighborhood was partly constructed in full-scale in Bucharest, with the rest done in postproduction.
The core creative team for BETC Euro RSCG consisted of creative director Remi Babinet, art director Gerald Schmite, copywriter Patrice Dumas, executive producer Simon Chater-Robinson and producer David Green. They came up with a concept designed to showcase Peugeot’s retractable roof technology which enables the four-seater 307 to go quickly from Cabriolet convertible to Coupe sedan and back, as needed.
Guillaume de Bary executive produced for Irene, with Francois Lamotte serving as line producer. The DP was Patrick Duroux.
Editor was Paris-based freelancer Philippe Kotlarski. Colorist was Bertrand Duval, another freelancer who worked on the assignment via Mikros, Paris. Audio post mixer/sound designer was Guillaume Le Guen of Capitaine Plouf, Paris.
