When you are telling a story, it is crucial to make sense. This is why the Mitsubishi Lancer commercial using the “Back to the Future” movie as a background did not impress me, even if it has millions of fans. When you do not have that sort of commitment, anything can happen, even tires screeching in the sand. What about Grace Jones eating a car?
That’s what happens when the singer, actress, and model made a Citroën CX 2 commercial in 1985. A mechanical representation of the singer’s head emerges from a dune, opens its “eyes,” turns to her right, opens its “mouth” and there comes the DS replacement. It then accelerates out of Grace Jones, makes its tires screech in sandy terrain, and its window opens to reveal the singer is driving the CX 2.
Jones then starts to sing (beautifully) and drives the car back to her mechanical mouth, which closes, turns to the initial position, closes its “eyes,” and burps, not before putting a massive hand in front of its “mouth.” Before the mechanical head gets back into the dune, we can hear the singer say the Citroën car’s name in French (it sounds like say-ex-duh) and declare “beauté sauvage,” which translates into savage beauty.
This is the sort of strategy in marketing that got people talking about the CX 2 because the commercial was so cool and funny. People were certainly asking themselves if they had watched Grace Jones emerge from the sand to spit a car and swallow it again with a discrete burp. Described like this, it sounds gross, which is why watching the whole thing is way better than reading about it.
In 1985, the CX was in the middle of its long life cycle, which started in 1974 and ended in 1991. This commercial introduced the Series 2 vehicles. In the original design, the car had stainless steel bumpers and a softer hydropneumatic suspension.
Externally, the CX Series 2 adopted plastic bumpers. Inside, the vehicle lost its “revolving-drum” instruments to adopt more conventional ones. The radio moved to the center console, beside the hand brake, instead of being close to the steering wheel, in the location where you find it in most modern cars.
The CX 2 was known as a “stalk-free” vehicle, with all commands placed around the dashboard, but still close enough for the driver to reach them. The steering wheel had a single-spoke steering wheel, just like the DS. Curiously, none of that appears in this crazy commercial. Either we only have a short version of the advertisement available, or it was really not interested in presenting the new features the CX 2 had to offer.
Grace Jones and the Citroën CX 2 are now classics, even if only one is retired. That’s an excellent opportunity for Citroën to hire her again to promote its products, especially after it felt at ease to present innovative vehicles and propositions again, respectively, the Ami and the Oli.
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