IT’S GOT AUSSIE-NESS
Looks good, sounds great, fits the family — the Calais-V is right at home here
IT’S A REINVENTED AUSSIE CLASSIC
It’s always been the quintessential family car, the classic vehicle that most families had, or had an uncle with in the 1980s.
We’d clamber into the back of a Holden Commodore, press our bodies up against the velour seats and beg to be able to push the Madonna tape into the cassette player.
There we would sit, three across the back seat. If we needed to squeeze a neighbour’s kid in we’d just stretch the seat belt a little further as we slurped our Paddle Pops on the way to the public pool where we would spend the day flinging ourselves off the diving board completely unsupervised by anyone over the age of 14.
It was a classic Aussie childhood, with the classic Aussie car transporting us at every turn.
So that was in my mind when I was presented with a 2018 Holden Commodore Calais-V to test drive.
In this time of soccer mums and SUVs, hyper-vigilant parenting and strictly organic snacks, is it possible that the Commodore can still fill the bill as a family car?
IT’S NOT LIKE ANY COMMODORE BEFORE
If you expect two-tone paint and a boxy shape you are in for a shock. There is nothing boxy about this European version.
Our Calais-V V6 all-wheel drive is a modern looking car for a modern family. The Aussiemade Commodore was a regular sedan and the new one is technically a liftback — something halfway between sedan and hatchback.
This Commodore is built in Germany, Australian production having halted. Car folk will tell you it’s a rebadged Opel but it has been tweaked for local roads by what remains of Holden’s engineering staff.
There must be something about the inherent Aussie-ness of the Holden because the minute I pulled up in this new-age Calais I was swarmed by blokes from our suburban cul-desac curious about the new-age Commodore.
... BUT IT SOUNDS LIKE ONE
Perhaps the good folk in Germany added a special soundtrack feature to the engine — there was something so very authentic about how this car sounded. It roared.
“It sounds like a sports car, mum,” says my 10-year-old as we take the Holden for a spin. And with the windows down, it does.
The Calais-V drives all four wheels via a nine-speed automatic so there is both grip and go. It multiplied tenfold the desire of my boys (the other one is eight) to ride in really, really fast cars.
For a sports car novice like me it handled well and felt quite low to the ground compared to the SUV’s I usually pootle around the suburbs in. It felt powerful and European, with light, responsive steering and a handy turning circle.
WHERE DID THE VELOUR SEATS GO?
The inside will surprise and delight. Holden has created a large, spacious, luxury interior with a wraparound dashboard, eight-inch touchscreen and — cassette deck be gone — Bose audio that when pumped up to the top volume sounds pretty amazing.
Merely sitting in it is a heap of fun. All seats are heated and the front pair are also ventilated.
The spacious rear seat probably suits a pair of passengers rather than three, especially as kids get older. But while they are still little you’ll be pleased with the two Isofix child seat mounts in the back.
WE’VE ALWAYS TRUSTED HOLDENS, RIGHT?
No matter how many kids we managed to cram in the back seat of Uncle Paul’s Commodore back in 1988, we always felt safe. So does that safety stack up in 2018?
Check the long list of safety features and it’s hard to argue otherwise. There are 360 degree camera, autonomous emergency braking, lane-keep assist, lane-departure warning, forwardcollision alert, head-up display, rear view camera, parking sensors, rain-sensing wipers, park assist, blind spot monitoring and rear cross traffic alert. The headlights are matrix LEDs that can be individually dimmed so you can keep the high-beam on and not dazzle oncoming traffic.
THE BOOT LOOKS DIFFERENT
Being a liftback, instead of a classic sedan, the boot space looks nothing like what you used to have in your family Commodore. In profile at first glance, it looks like a sedan — but the bootlid and the rear window are one piece, similar to a hatchback. That means more room (490L) and the ability to load large objects you wouldn’t have dreamt of getting in a sedan boot, such as bulky prams.
DOES IT LIVE UP THE AUSSIE DREAM?
It doesn’t look like any Holden Commodore you’ve even seen before. Drive it, though, and you’ll feel right at home. It’s priced from $51,990 so, if you’ve got a small family and like a bit of grunt when you are out on the road (“Rev it, mum, rev it”), it’s well worth considering.