The Cars of Movies and TV

[darksabre]

This topic will cover a lot more turf that people think, but one of my favorite things is movies/tv where the cars are good and sometimes even important to the story.

We can name some classics like the Mustang from Bullitt or the Bluesmobile from Blues Brothers, but I'd love to see other people's favorites, especially if they're weird and obscure.

I'm going to start with one of my favorites, The Cars that Ate Paris (1974). It's a (cheesy/bad) cult classic Australian film about a small town where the teens go crazy and try to kill everyone in their wacky modified cars.

Here's the trailer:

 

When they made Mad Max: Fury Road they paid tribute to the Paris spike beetle

Edited June 21, 2019 by darksabre

[josie]

22 minutes ago, darksabre said:

 

When they made Mad Max: Fury Road they paid tribute to the Paris spike beetle

I have the art book for Fury Road and it's full of amazing sketches. So much thought and care and petrolhead nerddom went into it. I love it.  This sketch was from 1997.

Edited June 21, 2019 by josie

[josie]

Ok I'm going to go wide right with this one

I'm in a wanderlust-y mood and a film that really captures that for me is Into the Wild, film adaptation of Krakauer's book about Chris McCandless. It's a good summation of my interests- wandering, angst, human idiocy, survival, disaster. And artistically, the Supertramp bus, an old 1946 International Harvester K-5 bus from Fairbanks abandoned on a trail- really stuck with me. It had been a kind of shelter for remote hunters, and McCandless found it and ended up dying there. 

Of course, like all good remote things, it's become an overvisited problem- and it's in a dangerous area, so others have died trying to "pilgrimage" to it. I think they may have removed it, actually.

But its shape, its color, its "wildness"/haunted nature is a pretty good example of a vehicle adding to the myth/story of an already tall tale legend. 

[ubkev]

Ford is putting out the Bullitt Mustang again. That color is freaking amazing. The green just makes you look at it. There's one at the dealership about a mile from my house that keeps tempting me to go drive it.

Ok, movie cars, and TV cars! Here we go! Kit from Knight Rider! Roger Moore's Lotus Esprit in The Spy Who Loved Me. The S8 and more importantly the chase scenes from Ronin. Magnum's crappy Ferrari. Ferris and Cameron's awesome Ferrari. Charlie Sheen's Dodge MS4 Turbo Interceptor from The Wraith. Elenore. Charlie Babbitt's 49 Roadmaster convertible "straight 8, fireball 8!" And yeah, I'm gonna do it... Dom's Veilside RX7. That car was beautiful. In my opinion it was  the best car in that movie (first fast and the furious)better than the Charger and the Supra. Who doesn't love a rotary engine?

[spndnchz]

12 hours ago, josie said:

Ok I'm going to go wide right with this one

I'm in a wanderlust-y mood and a film that really captures that for me is Into the Wild, film adaptation of Krakauer's book about Chris McCandless. It's a good summation of my interests- wandering, angst, human idiocy, survival, disaster. And artistically, the Supertramp bus, an old 1946 International Harvester K-5 bus from Fairbanks abandoned on a trail- really stuck with me. It had been a kind of shelter for remote hunters, and McCandless found it and ended up dying there. 

Of course, like all good remote things, it's become an overvisited problem- and it's in a dangerous area, so others have died trying to "pilgrimage" to it. I think they may have removed it, actually.

But its shape, its color, its "wildness"/haunted nature is a pretty good example of a vehicle adding to the myth/story of an already tall tale legend. 

Looks like that Partridge family bus no?

[ubkev]

How did I forget the 81 DeLorean. Christine, the Plymouth Fury. The Mini's in The Italian Job. Will Smith's Porsche in Bad Boys. Blade's '69 Charger. The Lambo in Cannonball Run.

[Tondas]

Lest we forget the TV detectives:

Columbo

Jim Rockford

Starsky & Hutch

Dan Tanna from Vegas

Edited July 6, 2019 by Tondas

[ubkev]

@Tondas did you know James Garner picked out the Firebird himself to be Jim Rockford's car? He said Rockford's character wouldn't be able to afford the trans-am.

[Weave]

Favorite movie vehicles?

The unicorn Mustang from Gone in 60 Seconds,

and all of the amazing monstrosities in The Road Warrior

[SwampD]

General Lee.

And somehow, it wasn’t racist.

[darksabre]

12 hours ago, SwampD said:

General Lee.

And somehow, it wasn’t racist.

Sure it was. But I think people were willing to overlook it because the General Lee is cool as hell and the show itself is a ton of fun to watch. Plus, African Americans weren't much of a target audience for TV producers so I doubt anyone cared about their opinions much.

They tried to acknowledge it in that 2005 movie which sucked outside of Jessica Simpson as eye candy.

https://uproxx.com/hitfix/the-screenwriter-of-the-dukes-of-hazzard-movie-on-how-he-tackled-the-confederate-flag-problem/

It's honestly too bad the star car of Dukes of Hazzard was the General Lee, because unfortunately the passage of time has burdened it with something that makes enjoying it a little difficult. Ten years ago I might have made an argument in favor of leaving the General alone, but I couldn't do that now. I think the show, historically, has probably had a diverse fan base which has kept it popular. I doubt that will be the case going forward. There are plenty of hero cars to enjoy if you're a motorhead, and a lot of them are in better movies and tv shows to boot.

It is what it is.

[Sabres Fan in NS]

The only thing hotter than Agent 86's smokin' red 1965 Sunbeam Tiger in the original Get Smart TV show was the more smokin' hotter Agent 99.