BMW Above the Clouds Reframes the 7 Series as a Luxury Statement
BMW's Above the Clouds is a 45-second film created by Serviceplan Campaign International, Hamburg, and directed by Dan DiFelice, launched in Germany in January 2019 to mark the facelift of the BMW 7 Series and position the model as an independent luxury category beyond conventional automotive comparisons.
The film opens on a private-plane pilot grounded by bad weather, unable to break through overcast skies. Faced with that external obstacle, the pilot abandons the aircraft and transitions to a BMW 7 Series, which then moves through the landscape with the same commanding authority the plane could not deliver in those conditions. The narrative resolves on motion and mastery, with the automobile claiming the register of prestige transport that the aircraft temporarily surrendered. According to house-of-communication.com, the campaign was produced in 45-second and 30-second television formats alongside product-highlight films and social-media cutdowns, giving Serviceplan a layered toolkit for the international rollout.
The campaign was published in Germany and was described, per house-of-communication.com, as part of an international rollout strategy designed to establish BMW's luxury segment as a distinct product category in its own right. Florian Klietz, managing director and partner at Serviceplan Campaign International, stated in Horizont on 22 January 2019 that the intention was precisely that: to support the global reach of the 7 Series facelift while staking out an independent luxury identity. Production was handled by Tony Petersen Film GmbH in Hamburg, with Carlo Walther serving as producer and Steve Annis as director of photography, as documented across shots.net and house-of-communication.com. The Clapboard Score for Above the Clouds is 60 out of 100, reflecting competent craft and a coherent metaphor that nonetheless does not fully escape the conventions of prestige automotive film-making.
Bayerische Motoren Werke faced a specific competitive challenge in 2019. The German premium automobile segment was growing, but growth was incremental: the core German premium market was expanding at approximately one to two percent annually around that period, according to best-selling-cars.com, meaning differentiation rather than volume was the lever available to brands at the top of the market. Against that backdrop, a pure product launch film risked disappearing into a crowded category message.
Mercedes-Benz delivered 2.34 million passenger cars globally in 2019, up approximately 1.3 percent versus 2018, according to Jp Reuters. Audi delivered 1.85 million vehicles globally in the same year, up 1.8 percent year over year, per best-selling-cars.com. BMW brand delivered 2.17 million vehicles globally in 2019, up approximately 2.0 percent versus 2018, according to press.bmwgroup.com. Both Mercedes-Benz and Audi, BMW's most direct competitors in Germany and across the global luxury automobile space, were growing at comparable rates, which compressed the space for a conventional performance narrative. A claim about engineering alone would not move the conversation.
Serviceplan Campaign International's strategic answer, as articulated by Florian Klietz in Horizont and corroborated by house-of-communication.com, was to remove the 7 Series from direct automotive comparison entirely and place it in the company of private aviation — the most widely recognised signifier of unrestricted, private luxury mobility. By staging the BMW 7 Series as the vehicle that resolves a problem even a private jet cannot, the campaign argues for categorical superiority rather than segment leadership. In Germany, where luxury automobile heritage carries specific cultural weight and Bayerische Motoren Werke is a domestic institution, that register of aspiration carries credibility that an internationally produced spot might not automatically earn.
Director Dan DiFelice led the production of Above the Clouds for BMW through Tony Petersen Film GmbH in Hamburg, with Steve Annis serving as director of photography, as confirmed by shots.net and house-of-communication.com.
The creative execution rests almost entirely on the coherence of its central metaphor. A private aircraft, universally coded as the apex of personal transport luxury, is shown yielding ground to the BMW 7 Series. The transfer of prestige is visual rather than verbal: the film communicates through atmosphere, movement, and the quality of light rather than through voiceover argument. Steve Annis's cinematography supports this register — the palette is cool and restrained, the motion deliberate, and the 45-second runtime tight enough to sustain the metaphor without over-explaining it. Location service was provided by LS Productions, as documented by shots.net, suggesting exteriors chosen to amplify the sense of scale and weather that the narrative requires.
Florian Klietz, in his statement to Horizont on 22 January 2019, framed the creative logic explicitly: from his point of view there is hardly anything as majestic as an airplane breaking through the clouds, and that majestic quality is precisely what the film transfers onto the 7 Series. Horizont described the finished spot as elegant and stylish, characterising the aircraft-to-BMW metaphor as presenting the luxury car as overcoming external and internal resistance — a reading that credits the film with more psychological complexity than a standard product launch spot typically attempts. The 30-second cutdown and social-media formats, per house-of-communication.com, required the same metaphorical argument to compress without losing legibility, which is a structural demand that tests whether the concept is genuinely cinematic or merely scenic. Above the Clouds largely passes that test, though the resolution remains more atmospheric than emotionally surprising, which is one reason the film reads as accomplished rather than outstanding.
No verified performance data for Above the Clouds is publicly available. BMW has not published campaign-specific sales lift or market-share attribution for the 7 Series facelift launch, and no figures appear in press.bmwgroup.com, house-of-communication.com, or any other documented source reviewed for this analysis. The campaign received no recorded entries or awards at Cannes Lions, the Effie Awards, The One Show, D&AD, the Clio Awards, the Webby Awards, or WARC, per the research documented at clapboard.com.
What the available record does confirm is trade recognition in Germany. Horizont, the German advertising and media trade publication, reviewed the campaign positively on 22 January 2019, describing it as elegant and stylish — a designation that carries weight in the domestic German market where the publication serves as an authoritative industry voice. BMWBlog also reported on the campaign on the same date, confirming the Serviceplan collaboration and the positioning intent, as noted by bmwblog.com.
Structurally, the film is well engineered for its purpose. The private-aviation metaphor is legible across cultures, which supports the international rollout ambition that Serviceplan stated explicitly. The multi-format production — 45-second and 30-second spots, product films, and social cutdowns, per house-of-communication.com — demonstrates a campaign architecture designed for sustained media presence rather than a single broadcast moment. Against a competitive Germany luxury automobile market in which Mercedes-Benz and Audi were both growing at low single-digit percentages annually, according to jp.reuters.com and best-selling-cars.com, a campaign that elevates category framing rather than competing on specification is a rational strategic choice. The Clapboard Score of 60 out of 100 reflects that the execution is competent and the strategy coherent, while stopping short of the creative risk that would make Above the Clouds a benchmark rather than a solid example of the genre.
Above the Clouds is a 45-second film created by Serviceplan Campaign International for BMW, launched in Germany in January 2019 to support the BMW 7 Series facelift. The campaign positions the 7 Series as an independent luxury category by showing the car surpassing a grounded private aircraft, as documented at clapboard.com.
Dan DiFelice directed Above the Clouds for BMW. Production was handled by Tony Petersen Film GmbH in Hamburg, with Carlo Walther as producer and Steve Annis as director of photography, as confirmed by shots.net and house-of-communication.com. The film was created by Serviceplan Campaign International for the German and international markets.
Above the Clouds promotes the BMW 7 Series facelift, launched in January 2019. Per house-of-communication.com, the campaign was designed to establish BMW's luxury segment as a distinct product category and support the international rollout of the updated 7 Series across Germany and global markets.
Horizont, the German advertising trade publication, reviewed Above the Clouds on 22 January 2019, describing it as elegant and stylish. The publication characterised the aircraft-to-BMW metaphor as presenting the luxury car as overcoming external and internal resistance, a framing that positions the film above a standard product-launch execution.
Above the Clouds receives a Clapboard Score of 60 out of 100. The score reflects coherent strategy and competent craft in a well-constructed metaphor, while noting that the execution does not fully escape the conventions of prestige automotive film-making to reach benchmark status, per clapboard.com editorial assessment.
No awards for Above the Clouds have been identified across Cannes Lions, the Effie Awards, The One Show, D&AD, the Clio Awards, the Webby Awards, or WARC, according to research documented at clapboard.com. The campaign received positive trade coverage in Horizont in Germany but did not enter the major international award circuits.
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