ar giant Ford is bringing cult actor, Steve McQueen, back to life for a new $200-million advertising campaign it hopes will have a similarly reviving effect on its flagging US sales. Ford is hoping to capitalise on the huge popularity of the 1968 hit movie Bullitt, whose thrilling car chase featuring lead character Frank Bullitt in a Ford Mustang is one of the most famous scenes in Hollywood history.

For the new ads, Ford�s ad agency J Walter Thompson recreated the actor with a body double, using digital editing to superimpose McQueen�s famous steely gaze. The commercial begins with a farmer using a bulldozer to build a racetrack in his cornfield before pulling a new Mustang out of his red barn and taking it for a spin. As he pulls up McQueen emerges from the cornstalks and the farmer tosses him the car keys. McQueen, as Bullitt, tears off down the track. ... more