Motion Pictures Car Movie Fun-Facts

It's always the crazy chicks fault.


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According to the makers of Christine in the DVD documentary, 28 Plymouth Furys were purchased and restored for the film, which in reality…some were Belvederes or Savoys dressed to look like Furys. At least one '57 Savoy was used, its front end modified to look like a '58. A few were show cars that were used whenever Christine is just sitting there looking pretty, or whenever Arnie is driving her.

There were some with souped up engines and airplane landing lights for the headlights, used in Christine's rampages. And there were junked and shell cars for the versions of Christine in disrepair or for her death scene at the end of the movie. One of the ways to tell which cars are the showcase hot rod cars and the stunt cars are if you look at the under grill beneath Christine's front bumper, the showcase cars have a chrome under grill, while the stunt cars have a red painted under grill.

Originally, John Carpenter had not planned to film the car's regeneration scenes, but decided after the filming was done to include them in the movie. The scenes of the car regenerating itself was done using hydraulics. Such neat stuff.

This is a picture of one of the two surviving models of Christine used in the movie.

 

Frank Mitchell who was a huge NOS MoPar parts dealer supplied a lot of the grills and trim used in the movie, he did pretty well but a shame to see such rare trim killed off.

I do wish my car had the repair itself option on it, would save a lot of time and money.


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Yeah, Hollywood's rough on iron.

I know, right? And we all want our cars to be a little more loyal and caring as well.

 

Most movie sports cars are remembered for being cool. This one starred as a forgettable junker.

Here's a few photos I shot in 1983 or '84 of the 1963 (64?) Corvette my friend said he bought from the set of the 1981 William Hurt & Kathleen Turner movie "Body Heat".

He said he got it cheap, due to its bad condition -- as depicted in the film it was "cast" to be a crappy old Corvette driven around by William Hurt's character.

My friend put an aftermarket one-piece front end on it, new wheels and tires, professional repaint, side pipes, and I think he upgraded the manual tranny with aftermarket (I think it was a Doug Nash five speed).

The engine was a 327. He told me he rebuilt the engine to factory high-output spec's for that year engine.

The drop top was in rough shape, un-changed from the movie set purchase.

He took me for a spin in this thing, and it was damned fast.

I also recall he briefly dropped this 327 engine into his new Z-28 for some fun, before returning it to the 'vette.

When I asked if he'd ever lost a race in this car, he said a slightly later model 'vette with a built 427 smoked him.

The last time I spoke with him a year or so after I took these photos, he said he sold the car and the new owner wrecked it.

 

^^^ That's a cool Vette. Thanks for posting.

 

When the '55 Chevy is chasing the student in the beginning of "Sometimes They Come Back", you can see the vehicle carrying the camera reflected in the hubcaps and the front fender. And when the greasers ram the car which Scott Norman is hiding under, it is obvious that Scott is not under the car when they ram it. And when they "come back", the greasers are able to drive their car without the keys which Jim took from the crash scene in 1963, yet they seem to need them to drive out of the tunnel during the finale.

 

that compressor was not even produced at that time. just sayin

 

In the Burt Reynolds movie "GATOR" he is driving a brown hot-rodded plain jane Ford sedan. In one shot he shifts using a floor shifter, then as pulls up and stops he puts in park with a column shifter?

 

Way back when,,,,
I was walking the isles of the Pomona Swap Meet and a gentleman had all these weird parts including some red Plymouth fenders that were just not right... so I asked,,, they were the front fenders from Christine, the ones for the self fix,, and they were made of molded rubber... I don't remember if they 'crushed' them then filled with air or the other way around and sucked the air out.
He had no takers,,,

 

There is a "secret" car that appears in American Graffiti. At the point right as Milner pulls up next to the Cadillac full of girls, a car crosses the intersection in front of the camera. All that can be seen is a flash of yellow.

If you watch the movie on DVD, hit pause just before the yellow flash then continue forward frame by frame and you will see a super bitchin', bright yellow '57 Chevy two door wagon with no front bumper, chrome reverse wheels and black walls. Awesome machine.

That is the only time that car appears in the movie.

Seeing this machine is what inspired me to pull the front bumper off of my '57 Chevy Sedan Delivery.

 

Yes, he is the same guy with his hair grown long. The Seven Ups chase scene was done by the same crew that did the Bullit chase. They are very similar, they even found some hills to jump over in Manhattan.

The movie is crap, but it's worth owning for the chase scene.

 

Yeah, kinda goofy, but on hard packed dirt (even with a bit of dust on top), tires will sometimes squeal. I see/hear that happen at El Mirage on occasion.

 

1986 Ken Wahl Robert Culp "The Gladiator" another '69 Charger eats shit

 

Knowing they missed the pumps in the gas station at the end of "Bullitt" with the Chrager, I can't watch it without looking to the left of the screen at the explosion and seeing it bounding off in the dirt well past the pumps. Anyone else ever see that?

 

Think James Bond was the first to drive an Aston-Martin in the movies? Check out the ride Tippi Hedren is driving in Hitchcock's The Birds. It's a DB2. Also, First car Bond drove in the movies was the 57 Chevy convertible in Doctor No. Second car was a Sunbeam Alpine (not a Tiger) later in the movie. By the time Goldfinger came out, Ford was a sponsor and supplied many cars, including an all-new 64 Mustang. First car Bond drove in the books was a Bentley. Not what us Americans think of as a sexy car.

 

Yep. Obvious booboo.

 

In the movie "The Choppers", while their truck is driving down the highway, a 1957 Plymouth cop car pulls up behind them and turns on its siren to have them pull over. But, when the car pulls alongside of the truck and forces it to the side of the road, it has turned into a 1959 Chevy. lol

Plymouth:

Chevy:



And Tommy Ivo built the T-bucket in the movie. It had a 322 Buick "Nailhead" V8 bored to 402. Owned at the time by Bill Rolland.

 

This American thinks this one is:

Just sayin, and there's several variants. John Steed drove one in The Avengers. To be fair, there's a few rather stodgy versions. However, with ample room within and a steady supply of female companionship...

 

My father and I were extras in the Silvester Stallone movie FIST about Jimmy Hoffa. They had a framed model of the traffic jam with each car and truck made of wood. I was on a 51 White COE with a show chrome fifth wheel that was covered with black vinyl cover. We were told to position ourselves so that we could see 3 of 5 cameras or we would not be seen. The traffic scenes had a line of period correct cars drive into scene and do a u-turn and head back the other way. When the cars crossed, filming started. Ever since then, When I watch car scenes in movies I try to spot the cars going each way. Allot of crashes and stunts are called stock footage and used in multiple movies due to the cost.


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Now THAT's a sexy Bentley!

 

i just saw that episode of "perry mason" a few nights ago. that was a custom riviera--george barris' personal ride at the time. it originally was red.

 

Sorry to revive a 2 year old thread but here are some of my tidbits of useless knowledge

When Richard Ruth built the two 55s for 2 Lane he took one of them out and raced it before handing them over to the studio. The rumor was he won $150 and the car went 10.90

Both of the 55s were painted a light blue by Ruth. The studio's decided it wasn't the right vibe so they shot the cars in primer and weathered the look

The inside camera car for 2 lane proved problematic with the L-88 427 loading up as it idles or was driven slowly for extended periods of camera time. They were constantly "changing jets" and fiddling with it. In the end they yanked the L-88 and replaced it with a more sedate single carb 454

The 454 replacement for the inside shot car in 2 lane also had air conditioning added for the actors comfort as well as a fake carb mounted between the cowl and the air cleaner so it looked like a tunnel ram from the windshield

In "The California Kid" when the sheriff is checking out the 34... the engine shot they use is the 4 carb sbc from Milner's American Graffiti coupe. Other shots during the movie clearly showed the engine to be a sbf with a single carb and round air cleaner

Milner's 32 might have been the fastest thing in the valley - but it was one of the worse running cars in the Graffiti production. Selected because it already had a chopped top, they painted it a sort of a cross between piss yellow and puke green, bobbed the fenders, added sprint car headers, a T-10 transmission and added a pouch to the doors for the "ticket scene". But the 4 carb 283 (or 327 depending on the story) ran very poorly. In More American Graffiti, you can clearly hear it running like crap. Even if it did run well, it is unlikely that open 57 Chevy diff would have handled much power

After principal shooting for Graffiti was complete the cars were put up for sale. The Milner Coupe didn't sell so it sat in a back lot until More American Graffiti was shot

Did anyone notice the drag chute on the tailgate of the truck parked in front of the Pharaohs Merc ??

The Mad Max Falcon... Last of the V8 Interceptor, is a limited edition 1973 XB Falcon GT351 was powered by a 351 Cleveland. No... the clutch driven supercharger is not a real thing. In fact the supercharger wasn;t functional at all.

The Mad Max Falcon was also put up for sale before the movie was released and it to did not sell... It was given to Murray Smith who was one of the staff on Mad Max

For Mad Max II the Falcon was bought back by George Miller and heavily thrashed. Once again it did not sell and sat in a wrecking yard in Melbourne for years before it was restored by Bob Forsenko

David Freiburger's F-Bomb twin turbo Camaro cannot do rolling wheelies on sand... sorry to burst that bubble folks.... but like many of the wheel stand special effects in Furious... it's all movie magic. In fact... it's a clone of David's 9 second street monster

The Charger in Fast and Furious that was used for the garage scene had a real BDS 8-71 supercharger sitting on a real 528 Hemi.

 

Like your by-line in your signature. Sort of like the last words you say before meeting the emergency ward nurse; "Hold my beer and watch this!"

 

Hello,

Tommy Ivo has been in a ton of car related movies with all sorts of hot rods. His T- bucket was one of our favorites in those early days. We thought it was better than the one we tried to make in a model car kit, the Grabowski “T.” (to each his own) While researching a story on Tommy Ivo, I came across this scene from one of his movies and a memory capsule popped into my brain.

Ghost of Dragstrip Hollow 1959

Having watched these movies back in those early days, surprises pop up here and there. In the movie “Ghost of Dragstrip Hollow”, there is a scene in a garage. Those hot rods and drag race cars are pretty cool. Especially when one or more of them is Tommy Ivo’s early single injected Buick FED. Then the T-Roadster and one familiar 4 cylinder FED that was center scene.

Tommy Ivo, injected Buick FED in the background 1959

Jnaki

The plot like those in this style of movie is a little silly, but for the times, it was entertainment. One of the FED race cars in the garage seemed pretty familiar. TV Tommy Ivo had many of his friends’ cars in those early movies. The white 4 cylinder race car looked awfully familiar to me. I knew I had seen it somewhere. So, I checked my film files...
Lions 1959
WHITE 4 CYLINDER FED

The chassis looks familiar and if it were painted red with an injected Buick or 671 Buick, it becomes Tommy Ivo’s Buick powered FED.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-2omkY70_4 1958-60 Ivo single Buick progression

 

I don't know if it's been mentioned but what about when Millner runs over the pump island after uncapping his headers before the race in American Graffitti?

 

Probably like other scenes, ie. Toad running scooter into trash can and Toad almost not catching bottle of booze at the liquor store, was not intentional but was more realistic. George Lucas liked some of the "goofs" (in other movies would have been in the blooper reel), and didn't do retakes. Plus time and film is money.

 

The Opel is shifting gears, but the driver has both hands on the wheel??

 

Just watched Hot Rod Girl on the plane the other day. Actually a good movie, a young Lucas McCain aka Chuck Conner player a good role in it.


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Just saw the White Dodge Challenger from Vanishing Point at the Floyd Garrett Muscle Car Museum in Seveirville while doing the Dollywood thang. Still has the dirt on it(not sure if its 'original dirt'...but dirt none-the-less). Gotta lotta cool muscle cars there!
6sally6