Today Epic Records and Jeep launched a global brand campaign for the car company’s Altitude Edition in which Michael Jackson’s new single “Love Never Felt So Good” is featured in four 30-second TV commercials. The campaign will air from today (May 8) and run through summer.

The track is from Jackson's second posthumous release “Xscape” (out May 13, Epic) and was co-written in 1983 by Michael Jackson in a session with Paul Anka (who played piano on the track) and Kathy Wakefield. Two new versions of the song were recorded: one produced by John McClain co-executor of the Jackson estate (with John Branca) is featured in the new ad; and another helmed by the trio of Timbaland, J-Roc and Justin Timberlake finds JT duetting with Michael and debuted this week at No. 20 on the Billboard Hot 100.

The campaign's origin came in late-March when Epic chairman and CEO Antonio “LA” Reid played the album for Chrysler CMO Olivier Francois. “I played him almost every song,” Reid says. “When we played 'Love Never Felt So Good' he made the connection and went ‘Bingo! This was what I was looking for!'" Francois, for his part, says that when he first heard the track he got up off the couch in the Epic offices and started dancing and hopes the ad will have the same impact on consumers.

A former music producer and publisher, Francois is credited with rejuvenating Chrysler's music branding strategy with an impressive string of ads featuring major music placements. This includes Eminem’s two-minute Super Bowl ad for Chrysler; the new Fiat spot with Sean “Ciroc" Combs at a desert party while Pharrell Williams’ “Happy” blares; and a previous ad for Jeep with Lenny Kravitz. Jackson, however, provides Francois a greater opportunity to take his work global.

When asked how big the spend would be on the new campaign Francois wouldn’t give an exact figure but said it would be bigger than the Diddy Fiat spot. According to Kantar Media, Fiat spent $17 million on measured U.S. media in the first three months of 2014, when the still-active Diddy campaign was just starting to roll out.

Jeep also hired multicultural ad agency GlobalHuefor the creative who gave the commercial a summer-y outdoor feel. One ad is shot primarily at the beach, another is more World-Cup-friendly and shows celebratory Latin American soccer fans while another focuses on basketball and features Cleveland Cavalier point guard Kyrie Irving. That campaign was co-sponsored by USA Basketball, which holds global b-ball tournaments throughout summer.

Nearly five years since Michael Jackson's unexpected passing, his brand shows little sign of flagging. Since his death on June 25, 2009, Jackson's albums have sold 12.8 million in the U.S., according to Nielsen SoundScan. His “This Is It” concert film grossed $261 million worldwide while "Michael Jackson: The Immortal World Tour," a partnership between the Jackson estate and Cirque du Soleil, last year became the ninth-top-grossing tour of all time with earnings of $325.1 million from 407 shows drawing nearly 3 million concertgoers. A second Cirque du Soleil show, "One," began a residency at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas last year.

Music from "Xscape," according to Reid, will also be featured in ads by Xperia, a line smartphones and tablets by Sony, Epic’s parent company. The label chair said the ads will air outside of the U.S. He also confirmed that Pepsi, which has had a long-standing relationship with Jackson, has no immediate plans for a tie-in with this album. A video currently being filmed for the Timberlake version of “Love,” however, will feature one rather large product placement: a Jeep Altitude.

Two Colombian men attempt to smuggle cocaine up the Pacific. That's the slim, basic trajectory of director Josef Kubota Wladyka's first feature, "Manos Sucias," and it rarely ventures beyond those restrictions. But that very minimalism gives its drama a personal quality steeped in the desperation of its lower class anti-heroes. Shot on location in and around Buenaventura, the movie has a frantic, gritty energy attuned to its characters' frustrations—not unlike the fiery sentiments found in the most polemical output of Spike Lee, who serves as an executive producer. Even so, Wladyka's debut has a more claustrophobic feel than anything in Lee's oeuvre; running just under 75 minutes, it's a fierce snapshot of reckless behavior enacted by helpless men.

At its center is Delio (Cristian James Abvincula), a pouty young black man eager to leave "that fucking construction job" and find a better life for his wife and infant child. In an early scene, he complains about economic and racial hindrances alike, pointing out to a friend that even in Bogota, the only black people work in servant jobs. These moments arrive as a flashback shortly after the establishing scene in which Delio joins forces with fisherman Jacobo (Jarlin Javier Martinez) to take on the uneasy job of cruising up the Pacific with their clandestine sack of drugs. As a result, the fleeting scenes in Buenaventura are weighted with dread: Delio has lost faith in any chance of a secure route to stability, which seals his fate in dangerous waters.

The ensuing narrative largely unfolds with just the two men on the boat, alternately discussing their fears, aspirations and the prospects of their scheme. Cinematographer Alan Blanco (who also co-wrote the screenplay with the director) capably frames much of the movie in closeups, allowing the dual protagonists' scowling, worried expressions to drive the story forward, while the grey ocean provides an abstract backdrop that highlights the sheer emptiness of their ambition.

The restrained setting has many precedents: While one could easily place "Manos Sucias" in a tradition stretching back to Alfred Hitchcock's "Lifeboat," a more contemporary reference point would be Lucy Malloy's 2012 drama "Una Noche," in which a trio of young Cubans attempt to row from Havana to Miami under similarly dire conditions.

But in "Manos Sucias," the men are as much a hazard to their situation as the uneasy waters around them. As they slowly progress toward a drop-off point, communicating with their menacing contacts on rickety cell phones, Wladyka regularly cuts to a POV of the ramshackle torpedo weighed down with 100kg of cocaine trailing their boat from a few feet away. Its watery perspective effectively conveys the murkiness of their only hope.

While marked by a pair of brooding performances, however, "Manos Sucias" isn't consumed by dreariness at every moment. An aspiring rapper, Abvincula's character has a playful demeanor that regularly surfaces whenever the action temporarily subsides; Martinez, playing an older, more professionally focused figure, radiates a paternal generosity toward his younger peer that ultimately leads him to adopt frightening measures for the sake of their survival. A vibrant soundtrack of local Colombian melodies hints at the happier world just beyond their reach. The movie regularly establishes a calm state only to veer back to duress: the duo's cozy discussion about soccer around the fire one night is counteracted by a sudden violent outbreak moments later; the final act arrives without warning and unfolds with a heightened sense of anguish.

"Manos Sucias" culminates with a singularly harsh act that takes its characters into much darker territory. Nevertheless, it's not much of a surprise when the movie gets there, given the limited range of possibilities for this minor drama. The lasting impression is one of several powerful moments strung together rather than a fully developed plot. Yet it's exactly that stripped down element that imbues "Manos Sucias" with a ragged feel not unlike the uncertain world inhabited by its leading men.

“By mid-century, it could become commonplace to interact with computers directly with the mind. … We may simply give mental commands and our wishes will be silently carried out by tiny chips hidden in the environment.” — Michio Kaku, “The Future of the Mind.

When we meet the scientists Will and Evelyn Caster, they’re the greatest couple maybe ever.

They’re a brilliant team, in the laboratory and at home. Will and Evelyn are on the verge of achieving revolutionary breakthroughs in the field of artificial intelligence — AND they’re the kind of effortlessly charismatic couple with a perfectly appointed home, a great wine always breathing on the dining-room table and perfect music wafting from an old-fashioned turntable stereo. Plus they’re played by Johnny Depp and Rebecca Hall, so they’re beautiful to boot.

And then one evening something terrible and sudden and shocking and tragic happens, and suddenly Will has only a few weeks to live, and that’s when “Transcendence” begins morphing into a thriller of the mind and soul with echoes of everything from “A.I.” to “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” to “2001: A Space Odyssey” to “Blade Runner” to “The Matrix.”

Directed by Wally Pfister, the cinematographer extraordinaire who lensed a half dozen films for Christopher Nolan (including all three “Dark Knight” movies), “Transcendence” is a bold, beautiful, sometimes confounding flight of futuristic speculation firmly rooted in the potential of today’s technology.

It’s the kind of movie that will have some viewers laughing at the audacious turns and twists. It’s a movie that had me thinking, “Wait, how did THAT just happen?,” on more than one occasion. The ending was underwhelming, and it raised at least as many questions as it answered.

And yet. What a stunning piece of work.

It’s hardly a spoiler alert when the trailer and the very poster for the film tell you what’s in store, but still, I urge you to proceed with caution and I pledge not to give away too much.

Depp is perfectly cast as Will, a slightly mad scientist, the kind of guy who probably considers Albert Einstein a fashion role model as well as a scientific role model, but can’t help but command every room he enters. Will’s the reigning rock star of his field. When he gives speeches, young men and women ask for his autograph.

“Imagine a machine with the full range of human emotion,” says Will in a presentation to a jam-packed auditorium. “Its analytical power will be greater than the collective intelligence of every person in the history of the world. Some scientists refer to this as the singularity. I call it transcendence.”

Shortly after Will utters those mind-boggling, awe-inspiring and slightly frightening words, a radical anti-technology terrorist group unleashes a series of attacks on labs across the country, killing a number of prominent geniuses and effectively erasing decades of research.

Will is shot. The bullet only grazes him, but it’s coated with a deadly toxin that will end his life within weeks. It’s a perfectly convenient plot device that gives Will, Evelyn and their best friend Max (Paul Bettany, who has nearly as much screen time as Depp) enough time to rig up a secret lab where they will attempt to upload every single thought, memory and personality trait of Will in an effort to keep the essence of Will alive after Will’s body gives out.

“Transcendence” doesn’t spend a lot of time on the spiritual ethics of such an experiment. There’s no discussion of any religion, so one assumes Will and Evelyn are not people of faith. (I was also left wondering why two of the greatest minds on the planet didn’t reproduce. Maybe they were afraid their kid would turn out to be an actual superhero.)

There is, however, much consternation about the ethics of this experiment, mostly on the part of Max. Evelyn’s love for Will is so strong she loses all sense of perspective when he appears to have returned. Sure, it’s beyond creepy that Will exists only as a voice and a moving image on a flat screen, like the next version of the Scarlett Johansson character in “Her.”

And when Will starts talking about acquiring bank codes and amassing tremendous wealth and building a secret underground bunker in New Mexico, you’d think Evelyn would get worried, but no. She’s just thrilled to have her honey back, especially when he can “remember” how they first met and he says “welcome home” every time she returns from that bunker.

Weird stuff. Morgan Freeman (who else?) plays Joseph Tagger, a mentor to Evelyn and Will who can’t believe his eyes when he first encounters Will 2.0. Cillian Murphy is the FBI agent convinced the A.I. version of Will is going to accumulate so much power and intelligence he’ll become the greatest threat to freedom the world has ever known. Kate Mara, all eyeliner and intensity, is Bree, the leader of the anti-technology group that seems less and less crazed as the story unfolds.

The screenplay for “Transcendence” from first-timer Jack Paglen is dense and fast and wildly imaginative and sometimes baffling. We get that Will is rapidly absorbing every bit of data available on the Internet and he’s using his ever-increasing intelligence to cure the sick and heal the planet, but then he starts developing skills that make him seem more like Loki from the “Thor” movies than a half-human, half-computer creation. You either go with it or you don’t. I went with it, even when multiple characters begin to sound exactly like Will.

Deep gives one of his most interesting performances, in part because he’s not wearing an elaborate costume or affecting some crazy accent. In fact he uses only his voice and his face for much of the performance. Rebecca Hall is the heart and soul of the film as Evelyn. Bettany and Freeman and a half-dozen other familiar faces are solid.

It’s little wonder the man who photographed “Inception” was intrigued by such a challenging puzzle of a thriller. This is the best kind of science fiction. I’ll bet Ray Bradbury and Rod Serling would have applauded this material.