Motion Pictures renting to movie people?

I rented a Challenger to a production company that filmed a bunch of commercials for ESPN in the later 90's. They paid me $1750 to use it for 4 days. They invited my wife and I on the set to watch the filming. It was pretty neat. Lot's of food, and tons of stress. The property master and grips basically had ZERO respect for the car. They strapped a camera rig to the hood so tight it was flexing up in the front and rear. Mind you, the car had an oirg. T/A hood on it, and I was freaking the hell out! The stunt driver had no mercy on it either. He put it through its paces, and beat the ever living shit out of it. The Zappa brothers were driving it and hit a set of railroad tracks and got it airborne. The driver and I talked a bit between filming and I asked him to take it easy, and he said 'That's what they pay me for.' My car wasn't perfect, but it was a VERY nice piece. They scratched the paint in several areas, and chipped my spoiler in several spots. I bitched when I picked the car up, and they wrote me a check for an additional $700 for the repairs. With all that said, just be prepared for whatever happens. If your not satisfied with the cars condition when you pick it up, TELL THEM! Good luck man.

 

i have had a few offers to rent my daughters showtruck to make a couple rap videos but being i was unsure of their west coast/east coast , no coast , bloods , crips or whatever affiliation i passed , i didnt want the my kid involved in some kind of revenge drive by..

 

I supplied the 34 Ford "Death Car" for both of the makes of "Bonney and Clyde" 1st with Faye Dunnaway,2nd with Tracy Needham...I could write a book about the dos and donts when working with movie people...Would take up too much space here to elaborate............I'll just say "DONT DO IT"........

 

Buddy of mine rented his car for the Movie Mischief in 1984-or 1985.
Chopped 51 Merc and they used it for background shots in the drive in and on the street. No one drove it. He knew that going in on it.
They had a 53 or 54 Chevy convertible and we watched the kids/actors climb in and out of that car, over the side and walking in the white seats.
Not sure whos car that was maybe they owned it, but that would piss me off.
We watched them set cameras up all day with a test pattern up and they probably had 10 to 20 seconds of kids opening doors and jumping out at a drive inn.

 

Unless your car is background, don't do it. Background cars are usually parked and left alone, or driven by the owner. I have seen a lot of decent cars fucked up by production companies.

 

There are agencies you can list your car in, just like talent agencies. They will call you if they think your car fits the bill and then you decide.

 

If you are going to rent your car to the movie folks keep one thing in mind. It is a PROP!! The only thing that is treated with any regard on a movie set is the "talent". Props are not talent they are considered disposable crap.

 

hehehe, That's been some funny reading here on this thread. I saw an advanced screening of Bad Boys 2 and a friend of mine who worked on it tells me, you have to see the old series land rover they blow up. So I saw it, and sure enough they blow up one land rover troop carrier and shoot up another one... Now I said to myself, I've seen those cars before. I visited a buddy's rover shop and it hit me, It was his rovers. I asked him, hey where are the old military rovers? He says, They're rented to some movie down here, have been for like 4 months. I said, OK, Have a seat........
1. Both your cars are totaled, one was literally blown to pieces and the other has more holes in it than a cheese grater. He said, that's fine, the rental for the first month alone paid for the cars... he later saw the film and laughed when he saw the cars being destroyed. The company brought him back the cars or what was left of them. and he scrapped them for metal. They had lifted the body off one of the frames and put in an LTD frame and engine set up to make it go faster then the little 4 cylinder rover engine could. If you know the guy who's providing the cars, it can be very lucrative.
I once got a 2001 convertible yellow porsche and we got another yellow front fender and some broken headlights from a luxury salvage yard here. If you look at the finished product, (swedish soap opera) you'd swear the car was on Fire, and the front fender was crumbled on a guard rail and the headlight was smashed sticking up from the bumper... Not a scratch, I drove it back to the rental shop the same day.
some folks take care of the cars. A Car has never suffered any damage on my shoots.

 

I got an offer to rent the back seat of my car for a porn flick, once. I went along with the offer, but, I told them I'd have to be on the set while the filming took place. I even made extra money that day. It seems the "fluffer" called in sick.

 

See, I always knew there was something odd about you.

 

My fathers friend had an early 50's Harley. Got a call one day not long ago, from a Hollywood guy. Few days later, and white truck, and trailer came with a large check to buy and pickup the bike. We are in Michigan. We have no idea how they found out about this bike, but apparently someone knew he had it and wanted that particular bike for a new Johnny Depp movie, in which he will be riding it.

 

Trust me... it's not just one thing.