Nissan Flirts with the Mold, but Fails to Break It

This new spot for Nissan (:30 and :60) immediately piqued interest: one car circulates a vinyl album. Interesting retro tones punctuate the background. The camera pans out, revealing many vehicles circulating many vinyls. It's an image that brings Warhol to mind.

What's going on? What'll happen next? Will Nissan pull a Dell?

Nah. One jalapeno-red maverick races off its track (cut to big Nissan logo!), encouraging others to do the same. (A vaguely familiar idea. Got a quote for me, Mazda?) They briefly fall in line, a tactic car advertisers seem to love, then park with a screech in haphazard fashion.

The 350Z, arguably Nissan's sexiest model, pulls abruptly into the foreground. The tagline follows: "Escape the pattern. Nissan."

Bleh.

Put together by Lew'Lara\TBWA in Brazil, the year-long campaign also includes print ads, equally earnest and equally dull:

o Full line-up -- "escape When you the pattern will?" Word salad. Cute idea. Let's see you use that as a tagline!
oNova Frontier -- same idea but just one car.
o Murano -- "Because Ordinary Street has an exit." To what, the fabled Fast Lane? If it looks like that tunnel, it's epilepsy waiting to happen.
o Tiida -- same caption, different car.
o Murano -- "You can buy a different car. Even if it's black or silver."
o Pathfinder -- same idea as the above.
o Sentra -- "Satisfaction guaranteed or your boredom back." Heh.
o 350Z and Sentra -- "Because common cars take you to the common place."
o 350Z -- "Ever seen one of these on the street? Need another argument?"

Clever way to use all the taglines that got kicked out of the final cut.