Maxima, revisited: Filmmaker’s 1996 Nissan returns to virality in a hilarious followup

 

 

Now here's a fun story to perk up the end of your Monday! It was about a year ago when we told you about Luke Aker, an Orlando-based filmmaker who smartly promoted himself with a hilarious parody commercial featuring his very own 1996 Nissan Maxima GLE sedan, for sale at the time on Craigslist. We don't know if the video, which quickly went viral, scored Aker any extra work, but it certainly caught the attention of Nissan's marketing department, who quickly snapped up the car for US$1,400 plus a US$1,000 charitable donation.

Now, a year later, Aker and his car have been reunited at Nissan's US headquarters in Nashville, Tennessee for a followup video. In the last 12 months, the car has been painstakingly restored to like-new condition -- no small feat, if you pay attention to its condition in the earlier clip. The new video is a lot more polished than that from last year, but it's every bit as tongue-in-cheek hilarious. See for yourself in both old and new clips, below: