A man strides across a beach, looking out to sea. He's wearing a pair of impractically tight shorts, all the better for accentuating his slim waist and rippling physique. A cacophony of orchestral strings slam into a wall of guitar noises as he powers his way through the white surf.
Suddenly he's on a boat at sunset, lounging provocatively amongst the rigging. A gravelly voice, heavily accented, murmurs something along the lines of "Frederique Jacob, by Frederique Jacob", a blue bottle flashes up and before you've quite got to grips with what the bloody hell is going on, your TV is now trying to sell you fish fingers.
This is the bewildering, indecipherable nature of perfume adverts. They are, by and large, pretentious, expensive and utterly shite.
Which is why we're thrilled to announce One Direction have managed to make a good one.
Related: 5 One Direction songs that you can admit to enjoying
Yep. One Direction. The tightly trousered British boy stars have slapped their name on a bottle of smell - called 'Between Us' - and they're perfectly aware how ridiculous the whole exercise is. The following 96 seconds of advertising are astonishingly well pitched, ripe with deadpan humour and self-deprecating nods.
We've misjudged you boys. And no, we're not going to buy your perfume either.
