Any list of the top automotive films has to include Claude Lelouch’s legendary short “C’était un Rendez-Vous.” Though less than nine minutes long, it’s been a must-see ever since it debuted 40 years ago. So to mark the occasion, Ford has recreated the classic – with a modern twist or two.
Dubbed “Re-Rendezvous,” the modern tribute was created in collaboration between Ford’s creative agency and the original director Claude Lelouch.
Instead of the Ferrari 275 GTB from whose front bumper the original was filmed, the recreation features a new Ford Mustang GT. It’s also being driven by a woman going to meet a man, instead of the other way around. And the route had to be altered here and there due to decades of change in the Paris cityscape. But the biggest change is enabled by four decades of technological advancement.
Where the original was filmed in a single shot from a single angle, the tribute was filmed in 360 degrees. So viewers of the video below can drag their cursors around to watch the footage from any angle – straight ahead like the original, up to watch the Parisian sky at dawn, down to see the cobblestones disappear below, to the side to see sites like the Arc de Triomphe or Montmarte whiz by, or even back to look at the Mustang’s snout.
Oh, and lest you think the idea of replacing a Ferrari with a Mustang is sacrilege, it’s not without precedent: Lelouch won an Oscar for his 1966 film “A Man and a Woman” that featured a white Mustang competing in the Monte Carlo rally.
“I had goose bumps watching ‘C’etait un Rendez-Vous’ forty years later in virtual reality. At the time, my movie was about the feeling of freedom and the pleasure driving generates,” said Lelouch. “I knew that Ford would do more than just a tribute to the original in this new version. I am delighted to see the Mustang again and to close the loop fifty years after ‘A Man and a Woman’”.