There's been a whole load of noise recently from Renault about how it's improving the quality and reliability of its cars, and the Laguna Coupe, while interesting, disappointing and pleasing in a whole number of ways, is certainly testament to the fact that quality and reliability are now not the big concerns for the French brand.

On the surface is where the Laguna is at its best. It's certainly a good-looking machine that has hints of Aston Martin, especially at the rear [1], while the interior quality, like the rest of the Laguna range, is a huge step up from what had gone before. The dashboard materials are specifically impressive [2], and illustrate that Renault is pouring effort into this area.

Unfortunately, delving a bit deeper reveals some flaws. While it couldn't be expected to match the likes of BMW's significantly more expensive 3-series coupe in driving terms, the Laguna seems to be caught between two ideologies. It's neither particularly fun to drive, nor the comfortable long-distance GT cruiser, thanks to a harsh ride quality that thumps over bumps and crevices rather than absorbing them, which gets a little tedious on motorway journeys. The audio and navigation [3] system is also unnecessarily awkward and unfriendly, although I did it a disservice by not discovering how to take off the 'amount of feet to junction' distance calculation. Closer inspection of the menu system would have revealed various settings that would have solved the gripe, so apologies to Renault on that score. The criticism of lacking postcode entry is valid, though, but Renault is solving that with the cheaper TomTom system making its way across the firm's model range.