2011 Mercedes-Benz E-Class Cabriolet «

Gene Hackman’s false-tooth character, Harry Zimm, drives a late ’60s Merc convertible in “Get Shorty.” It’s probably a 280 SE, and he drives it around L.A. with the top down perennially. John Lurie’s soundtrack music for it is called “To Be Alive and in a Convertible.”

Mercedes-Benz’s new E-Class Cabriolet is that sort of car. It recalls those old Mercedes ragtops far better than the two-generation CLK ever could. The automaker’s quest to compete with the BMW 3 Series is over until it introduces the imminent C-Class coupe. Meanwhile, Mercedes is emphasizing the new, larger car’s four-seat capacity. This is the kind of convertible you drive top-down when it would be too cold in other convertibles, the driver’s seatback tilted at a jaunty angle, your right arm wrapped around the back of the front passenger seat, the palm of your left hand on the wheel.

To make you keep the thickly insulated “acoustic” fabric soft top down more often, Mercedes has improved the Air Scarf, the grille vents in the front seats, between the seat and headrest that blow warm air from the heater to the back of your neck. Mercedes has been working on this: It’s much more effective than when it debuted on the current generation SLK a few years ago.

And for those stoplight attitude changes, the top raises or lowers in 20 seconds. You can even do that while rolling at speeds of up to 25 mph. Having the top down cuts into trunk space and as with the SLK and many other modern convertibles, you have to fix a trunk blocker that cuts depth capacity when the top is down.

The big new feature, though, is Mercedes’ Air Cap, a simple, but delightfully overengineered electrically operated panel that runs the width of the windshield header. Flip open a panel cover on the center console, press a button, and it pops up from the header. Combined with the adjustable plastic net wind blocker between the rear seat headrests, it flows air up and over front- and rear- seat passengers. Or so Mercedes says. Air Cap is designed to work best with the windows up, of course, and testing it from the back seat, where it’s designed to do the most good, at speeds of about 60 to 70 mph, it seemed to make a marginal difference. It may be just right, though, for bouffant-coiffed parade queens.