STAID SEDUCER

I can see the lime green mankini peeking out over your waistband

when you are not. A BMW waits for you to be an inch from the tree before it says, “Excuse me, sir. Can I be of any assistance in these troubling times?”

A BMW accepts that you are not a nincompoop. It accepts that you may be a very good driver, and that you may want to have some fun before the electronic nanny tells you to come inside and wash your hands before dinner.

Let me put it this way. If you have an Audi or a Mercedes or a Jaguar, you are telling the world that life is treating you well. If you have a BMW, you’re not really saying much of anything at all. You’re like the quiet, grey man on the bus. Nobody would guess that under your dignified, grown-up clothes, you’re wearing a lime-green mankini. In the 435i you really are, thanks to a little button that changes the characteristics of everything. Most of the time it’ll be set to Comfort, but you can go to Sport+, which sharpens up all the important stuff. It’s nice. I loved driving this car. I loved being in it as well.

Let’s be in no doubt. The 435i is not for everyone. It is not good value and it is no use for showing off. But if you miss the way Knightsbridge was. Or if you want a getaway car that no one will notice. Or if you are a grown-up. I can’t really think of any car that is better.

WHEN I first moved to London, during the war — with Argentina, that is — Knightsbridge was a genteel place full of old ladies and sausage dogs. It was an oasis of calm. Not any more. Now it’s one of the noisiest places on earth. This is because it has been bought, pretty much completely, by gentlemen from the Middle East, all of whom drive extremely loud supercars.

I shall be honest. I like a car to make a noise. I love the melancholy howl of a Ferrari F12. And the shriek from the Lexus LFA was up there with Roger Daltrey’s scream towards the end of Won’t Get Fooled Again. So I was surprised and, yes, a little bit disappointed when I put my foot down for the first time in BMW’s new 435i coupé, the sporty two-door version of the 3series. It’s nowhere near as dramatic as I’d been expecting. Yes, it’s lower and wider than the saloon — the rear wheels are about 76mm further apart — but it lacks visual presence.

And on the face of it, that doesn’t sound like such a good idea. When someone buys the two-door version of a four-door car, they are spending more money and getting less practicality. The only reason they would want to do this is: they want more style. And with the 4-series I’m not sure they’re getting it.

Which brings me back to the noise. Floor the throttle and all you get is a gentle hum, the sound of an engine that is doing a spot of gardening or popping down the road for a pint of milk. It doesn’t really sound as though it’s making much of an effort at all.

Maybe it isn’t. Because even though it’s a 3-litre turbocharged straight six, it’s producing only 225kW. That’s 10kW less than you get from the 3-litre turbocharged straight six in the smaller BMW M135i. What we have, then, is a car that is more expensive than the more practical 3-series and slower than the 1-series. A bad start.

But here’s the thing. While it is extremely enjoyable to put your foot down in an F-type Jag and listen to all those pops and bangs as you lift it off again, I have a sneaking suspicion that it might become wearisome. Certainly if I’m arriving at an adult’s house in my AMG Mercedes I do everything in my power to stop the engine from sounding as if a yobbo is pulling up outside. So, in the long run, a car that hums rather than shouts might be a more rewarding companion. We see this a lot with BMW these days. There was a time when they were brash and driven an inch from your tailgate by men with inadequate sexual organs. But not any more. BMWs have become . . . gentle.

With the 435i you still have the nearperfect weight distribution and an extremely low centre of gravity. It may not be the fastest car in the world but it is extremely rewarding to feel it turn one way as you go round a roundabout and then the other as you leave. Some cars wobble about; some lurch. A BMW just does as it’s told. A BMW also has extremely impressive antilock braking. Many cars these days are fitted with a system that cuts in too early. It thinks you’re panicking and about to crash