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When executives at Montblanc asked Wes Anderson a year ago to direct an advertising campaign celebrating the centenary of the brand’s Meisterstück pen, they got more than expected from the director known for quirky, iconic films including The Royal Tenenbaums and Fantastic Mr Fox.

Anderson agreed to their brief, which involved directing a short film focussed on the brand’s famous heritage and craft, but he also wanted to be the main character in front of the camera. Then, when he showed up on set in Berlin, the filmmaker presented a prototype pen of his own design that he asked the German company to manufacture. He’d even named it: the Schreiberling, which means ‘the scribbler’ in German.

That had not been part of the pitch. "Another surprise!" says Vincent Montalescot, Montblanc’s chief marketing officer, who recalls saying to himself, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa." It takes two to three years for Montblanc artisans to design a writing instrument. This one had been assembled by a member of Anderson’s set design team, based on a tiny Montblanc model. "We were like, ‘Wow, it fits the brief. Now, can we make it?’"

Yes, they could.

The film — part of an elaborate marketing effort built around a fountain pen — launches today, 1 May, alongside a pop-up Montblanc store on Rodeo Drive in Los Angeles. That store façade is painted the precise shade of green that Anderson chose for use in the film, and the interior includes much of the set he assembled at Studio Babelsberg in Berlin, where the ad was filmed with actors and frequent Anderson collaborators Rupert Friend and Jason Schwartzman. Part of the set will move later in May to Hamburg, where Montblanc is based, as a temporary exhibition.

The company is known to embrace quirky innovative approaches to marketing. It started a series of free online calligraphy classes, taught by professionals, during the pandemic. They proved so popular that they continue today.

Neither Anderson nor Montblanc are new to short film ads. Montblanc has worked with directors Wim Wenders and Spike Lee in the past. Anderson has done short films as advertisements for Prada, American Express and Stella Artois.

Montalescot, who declined to divulge the cost of the campaign, says the director brought a commitment to minutiae that was sometimes hard to fathom.

The short film opens with Anderson, Schwartzman and Friend appearing in mountaineering garb on a studio set supposedly at 4,810 meters elevation at the snowy summit of Mont Blanc, for which the company is named. They take turns, interrupting one another as they explain the company’s best-known offering, the pen.

"Some of them, they called it a safety pen, which I think means it has a cap so you don’t get ink on your pocket," says Schwartzman, as Friend trudges up behind him carrying a flag with the black and white Montblanc logo. "Actually, it was designed with a retractable nib, which sealed the ink in reserve like a cork," Friend corrects, planting the flag in the snow. "The Montblanc flag. I… brought it."

The following 10-second sequence, during which they enter a mountain hut, required 50 takes, Montalescot says.

"I have to admit that sometimes I did not understand. When does he consider that this is right and we can move on?" Montalescot says. "Rupert [Friend] was telling me he’s always that way."

Anderson spent two days on set in Berlin, working from 8am until 11pm. "There is almost no pause," Montalescot says. "You can get a sandwich if you want." Anderson left behind his film crew to work for another week to film more bits and pieces to enable the English-language film to appeal in markets important to Montblanc — especially China and Korea. Additional characters for these secondary pieces include the American actors Maude Apatow and Waris Ahluwalia as well as South Korean actor Lee Jin-wook and Chinese actor Jing Boran.

Montalescot calls it a "full ecosystem around the film" overseen by Anderson.

The film makes light-hearted fun, as each character holds up Montblanc products and mentions them, such as "very good paper", "more leather goods", "and ink". It’s in the style of a 1960s commercial where a spokesman holds a product while describing its characteristics. There are also unexplained props, like hot chocolate and pretzels. "I think that’s his perception of Germany — the Bavarian style," Montalescot says. There are mysteries, such as why Schwartzman’s beard, coated with snow in the opening mountain scene, becomes just a moustache as he enters the hut.

These touches remain as much a mystery to the Montblanc executives as they will to many viewers. Anderson was not available to comment, a spokesman said, as he is currently filming his next movie. (According to IMDB, that’s a comedy-action-thriller called The Phoenician Scheme, starring Bill Murray, Michael Cera and Benicio del Toro.)

Anderson’s tiny, green and yellow Schreiberling pen prototype appears in the film as a prop, and he appears in the film introducing it to viewers. After filming wrapped, the prototype went straight to Montblanc’s design atelier in Hamburg.

The company has already managed to produce 10 Schreiberlings, and intends to complete a run of 1,969 of them (Anderson was born in 1969) next year. For the time being, they will be available for pre-order, and to be delivered beginning in May 2025, priced at $2,500.

"You need to embrace the unexpected," Montalescot says.

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