BMW iVision Dee is a concept that the manufacturer is using to preview the look of the 2025 fully-electric 3 Series, as well as some of the pieces of tech that will debut with it. With that in mind, it’s certainly an important design study, so we don’t really understand why BMW opted to promote the study with this odd short film featuring two actors who were really big in the ‘80 and ‘90.
Arnold Schwarzenegger is the protagonist, and David Hasselhoff makes an appearance behind the wheel of KITT. In the film, Arnold engages in a conversation with Dee, BMW’s idea of an intelligent personal assistant that is built into one of its cars, and they seem to have diverging views when it comes to cars being better in the 1980s or if the modern tech-laden approach is indeed better.
After watching, we were left a bit perplexed as to what the message was. Arnold is actually pretty convincing in his defense of old fashioned cars and engineering while the Dee the digital assistant pokes fun at virtually everything he says. In the end, the two do seem to agree that the modern way is better, but as a viewer we were left rooting for Arnold who still didn’t seem completely convinced.
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The film reveals a lot of the topics that are probably currently being discussed within BMW. The automaker knows that it has to break with its heritage a bit in order to reinvent itself and become electric, and it knows there is a danger that in doing so the brand’s image could become diluted.
And the Bavarian manufacturer hasn’t really been doing itself any favors with some of its recent designs that seem like a far cry from the simple, elegant shapes it produced in decades past, many of which today have a cult following. Back then being premium was more about the quality of engineering and not the number of bells and whistles it put in its cars.
However, as the film tries to remind the viewer, the world has moved on since then and BMW has to adapt in order to keep up.
