This is a car that feels good when driven hard, but doesn’t demand rough treatment.

For those BMW fans who hated the looks of the 7-Series, redesigned in 2002, and who can’t stand the sight of the new Z4, we have some bad news.  The distinctive “flame surfacing” design theme isn’t going away any time soon, you see.  The 2004 BMW 530i is the latest offering from the German manufacturer to display the carefully sculpted, organic surfaces that have been envisioned on BMW show cars for years.

The new bodywork is evidence of a ground-up redesign.  In addition to the new face, the 530i reenters the …

There’s nothing quite like the confidence of driving with all four wheels.  Case in point:  2004 Audi A4 versus surprise early-spring Michigan snowstorm. As the snow came down and the salt trucks were sluggish to respond, drivers were fishtailing left and right.  The medians were full of overconfident sport-utes. Meanwhile, our serene silver sedan plowed through the worst of it without a complaint, illustrating the results of Audi’s long-term love affair with all-wheel drive.

The A4 is Audi’s lowest-priced entry into the sports sedan market, and it’s a familiar face. Getting …

The updated Mazda6 drives just like the previous version, which isn’t a bad thing.

Nissan’s entry into the growing muscle war among compact cars is a relative newcomer to the game.  The Sentra SE-R doesn’t have the rally-bred cachet of the Subaru WRX or the Mitsubishi Lancer.  Heck, even the Ford Focus has been rally racing.  It hasn’t got the classic nameplate of the Mini Cooper, the giant-killer attitude of the upcoming Dodge Neon SRT-4 or even the next-big-thing versatility of Mazda’s Protege5.  All the Sentra SE-R has is a nameplate that harkens to a wonderful little hot-rod coupe that flourished in the early …

Sure, you can afford a decent sports sedan.  Expensive European manufacturers no longer have a lock on that department with the introduction of Mazda’s newest family sedan.  Forget the old Mazda 626, because this isn’t it.  Chances are you’ve already forgotten it anyway, but that’s a good thing.

New for 2003, the Mazda6 is a larger, more powerful, arguably more loveable family sedan.  It replaces both the Millenia and the 626, and brings a healthy dose of “zoom-zoom” sportiness to the normally boring three-box sedan department.  It’s built on its own …

It’s not just the starched and pressed good looks of the Infiniti M45 that made us think of it as the automotive equivalent of a good butler.  It’s the subtle ability beneath the traditional-looking body.  Combining the 4.5 liter V8 found in the Q45 with a smaller body, the M45 (Infiniti’s first “M”-badged car since the M30 of the early 1990s) aims to be a full-scale sports sedan, like Lexus’ GS430 or Lincoln’s LS V8.

Like the old M30, the M45 is a square-rigged car.  This car is the embodiment of …

Some Mondays are just like this:  shortly after ten in the morning, I got a call from my best friend, whose faithful Escort wagon had just been clobbered at a traffic light.  She wanted to know if I’d come out and shop for a new car with her, and I was all too happy to hop into the 2004 Acura TSX in my driveway to oblige.

Her experience should’ve been a warning to me, however.  The Bad Drivers were out in force on this particular Monday.  I had barely gotten a …

In case you hadn’t noticed, retro is in.  Nostalgic fashions and television reunion shows have America looking to the past for inspiration.  Mercury is the latest to cash in on the craze for all things retro.   This latest automotive throwback comes from the 1960s, the heyday of the muscle car.  The 2003 Mercury Marauder is a full-size, body-on-frame, V8 powered high-performance car…just like the last Marauder was, in 1970.

Chevrolet went this route in 1995 with the highly successful Impala SS.   The Marauder successfully pushes the same buttons with a crouched, …

Isn’t this exciting?  It’s a Cadillac, but not like any Cadillac we’ve ever seen before.  At least not on the road, that is.  That big, grinning egg-crate grille is instantly recognizable, and yet it’s pushed all the way up to the bumper line as if in parody of itself.  The whole car is a conglomeration of flat planes, triangles and sharp edges.  Is it a car, or a three-dimensional computer graphic?

This is Cadillac’s future, and it looks pretty cool once you get used to it.  The new-for-2003 Cadillac CTS replaces …