The latest spot from Volvo and Forsman & Bodenfors is a three-minute film about a little girl with her whole life ahead of her -- but what, you may be thinking, does that have to do with cars?

As she sets off for her first day at school, the girl has a talk with her mom about all the things that are going to happen to her. "You're in control," the mom tells her. "You can decide what happens." As she sets off down the road, we see a montage of scenes of key moments from her life to come: making friends, growing up with them, traveling the world, falling in love, having her own baby.

At the same time, we see another woman driving through the city in a Volvo XC60, late for work. Their two worlds come together when the little girl steps out in front of the car: but its automated braking system makes it stop, averting a life-changing collision. The film, which was directed by Gustav Johansson at New Land, concludes with the words: "Sometimes the moments that never happen, matter the most."

This emphasis on the power of nothing seems a popular one in auto advertising at the moment: it's also a theme running through Volkswagen's recent work, including a spot from France that focuses on the beauty of nothing, and its U.K. cinema campaign showing how the cars' safety features would make Hollywood movies boring.