IWC Schaffhausen and Jean Reno jointly celebrate a film premiere | The Fan Carpet Ltd • The Fan Carpet: The RED Carpet for FANS • The Fan Carpet: Fansites Network • The Fan Carpet: Slate • The Fan Carpet: Theatre Spotlight • The Fan Carpet: Arena • The Fan Carpet: International

IWC Schaffhausen and Jean Reno jointly celebrate a film premiere


20 January 2010

Geneva, 19 January 2010 - The Swiss watchmaking company IWC Schaffhausen celebrated its new Portuguese watch collection on the occasion of the SIHH in Geneva amidst a setting inspired by typical yacht design features. Prominent guests joined invited business partners for the "IWC Dinner" at the Espace Sécheron, where they were enthused by the premiere of the IWC short film starring Hollywood actor Jean Reno.

More than 600 invited guests, including prominent personalities such as Zinédine Zidane, Boris Becker and Luís Figo, gathered for the cocktail reception hosted by IWC at the Espace Sécheron in a nautical ambiance. Also mingling with the guests, alongside best-selling author Paulo Coelho and Hollywood star Jean Reno, were Arsène Wenger, Alain Sutter and Tim Jefferies, who were visibly at their ease in the relaxed atmosphere. Various installations, attended by specialists, echoed the central theme of the evening: the fascination of matters both nautical and navigational. Here a meteorologist gave an introduction to the secrets and perils of forecasting the weather, followed by an expert who explained the significance and function of the sextant. One authority contrasted and compared modern and antique cartography and explored the intricacies of longitude and latitude, which to this day retain their relevance as coordinate systems for accurate positioning.

Film premiere with Jean Reno


The high point of the evening was the film premiere with Jean Reno: IWC, together with French actor and director Didier Flamand and Swiss production company Condor Films, has produced a short film for the relaunch of its Portuguese watches, which makes the origins and the fascination of navigation the centre of attention. "The Spirit of Navigation" is a mystical work full of poetry, a philosophical commemoration of the scientists, seafarers and astronomers of days long gone by. Hollywood actor Jean Reno moves through time and space as a protagonist in the midst of a magical production, acquaints the viewer with the art of navigation, which originated some 6,000 years ago, and recounts the development of early nautical instruments. Various levels, cinematic special effects and montages establish a link to the newly released Portuguese watches, the icons of IWC, which utilize the precise, sophisticated and elegant navigational instruments as their role model. After an exquisite dinner, it was the turn of Nils Landgren, one of the most successful European jazz musicians, and his band "Funk Unit", to take the spotlight. This virtuoso trombonist not only swept spiritedly across the stage, but also managed to enthral the audience with his solos alternating subtly between various styles.