Chris Pine and Larissa Hofmann - the 2014 Armani Code ad campaign

...and why it's creepy...

In our original review of Armani Code, we included a few comments on the 2010 advertising video featuring Enrique Palacios.

Well, here's the latest vid, starring Captain Kirk himself, Chris Pine, and the German model Larissa Hofmann.

Now, are we really the only ones who find it downright spooky?

So the concept is that young Larissa has been so taken with Chris's Armani Code that she just sees him everywhere: no matter which guy happens to be walking or standing near her, she sees Chris.  So when Chris - some sort of superstar even in the advert, since the paparazzi want a piece of him even there - picks her up in his $200k sport car and informs her: 'I thought I lost you', it is ironic we presume, because of course she was dementedly obsessing over him all along.  He's got no chance of shaking off this one.

A quick search online reveals that girls love the idea of a world populated by 'multiple Chris Pines'...  But surely it's just sinister?  The way that one of the Chris-replicants in a tie steps into Larissa's eye-line at 22 seconds is particularly spooky: it's like Chris is stalking her.

That, or Captain Kirk has suffered some terrible accident, and Scotty's beamed him simultaneously into 5 or 6 different locations, thereby inventing instant human cloning.

Or inhalation of Armani Code has brought on hallucinations and psychotic derangement in Larissa Hofmann's mind.  Armani Code is pretty good stuff, but we didn't think it had powers of that magnitude on women.

It's not the only thing that undermines the advert:  the soundtrack is Harshman's 'Barker', a re-mix of a tune from Rossini's Barber of Seville.  But that is a comic opera - not exactly in line with the suave, slick imagery of the advert.  Not only that, in Rossini's masterpiece - as I'm sure we all know - the central figure gets the girl of his dreams with great difficulty and only after paying off the old lecher who originally had his busy hands on her... all of which is at odds with the way that, in the advert, Chris Pine can get his girl simply by wearing cologne and putting his fancy car in reverse.  Speaking of barbers, Chris could do with a trim himself: just look at that stubble.

Gratuitous shot of an Aston Martin DBS...

In case you're wondering, Chris's car is an Aston Martin DBS, and if you watch this video, you'll find that fact pretty much confirmed at 1 minute and 29 seconds.  So to crown it all, Chris Pine is James Bond, Captain Kirk, a replicant and Count Almaviva all in one.  How very confusing.  You thought you lost us, Chris? Damn right you did!  

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Read the review of Armani Code here.