Do you have a favorite vintage movie car?

[Edward]

Mmn. Tough call. I love that cab in the Shadow... were I ever to have the cash, time and need of a car here in London, I'd adore something like that, not sure that it'd be best practical, though!

I would'nt be surprised if George Lucas did tamper with the cars: I read on this forum a while back that he's already altered some shots to turn a grey sky a blazing sunset for the DVD....

 

[kpreed]

1937 Buick Century

For anyone who does not know, the "Topper" movie car was a 1937 Buick Century.

Cord (my in-laws had a 1937) went broke and many car bodies got sold to other auto makers.
On fiberglass repro cars they have made a few for a long time. They are nice, but not cheep. Just my two cents.

 

[Tomasso]

I've been enamored with the Rolls Royce Phantom Sedanca de Villes of the 30's since childhood, after seeing them appear in two movies in the same year (1964); The Yellow Rolls Royce and Goldfinger.

 

[The Wingnut]

Not Golden Era...

My first car was a '68 Plymouth Fury III 2 door hardtop. I joined a Chrysler products club as a result, and one day we got a caravan together, drove 100 miles, and saw in a theater the world's last screenable copy of 1971's Vanishing Point, starring Barry Newman and an Alpine White 1970 Dodge Challenger R/T.

I was RIVETED. It wasn't because it was cool, the movie wasn't supposed to be cool(although ask anyone and they'll say it is...), it was a social commentary with an unusual delivery, a delivery that most couldn't grasp. The scenes with the JB Pickers' Freedom of Expression wailing in my ears along with a wrung-out 440 backed by a pistol-gripped 4-speed, Highway 80 and all of its stark scenery whipping by, amazing camera work all combined to blow my mind. I've wanted to roar across the Nevada desert on I-80 with acid rock blaring in my ears ever since.

...now you can't get a Challenger of any ilk for under 40 grand. I should have bought the one I saw 10 years ago for $1200.

 

[David Conwill]

IMO, American Graffiti shouldn't be touched...maybe the blue would look good on Milners Deuce, but in no way would a 409 Impy top Falfas 454 '55...and i'm pretty sure the Pharaoh Merc' didn't have any rake...just lowered a bit...
here's another of my favorites:

It's not so much the funky yellow on Milner's Deuce, but the chopped grille shell and the unchannelled body that screws the car up for me. The proportions on Idzardi's car are just so much more on.

As far as Falfa's car, while the '55 gasser is cool (although the 396-427-454 engines weren't out until 1965), I think that having a factory muscle car challenging the homebuilt hot rod makes a much stronger statement about the end of the hot rod era and the beginning of "bought rodding." It would be all the better if the car still had dealer plates on it.

As for the Merc, it's been a while and I can't find a good shot, but I do remember thinking the car sat funny for a lead sled.

Oh well.

As for Bullitt - yep, that's probably the world's greatest car chase. It has certainly influenced the way I have fixed up my Camaro. I had the pleasure to watch that film in an Art Deco movie palace in Bay City, Michigan not too long ago. A great experience indeed.

-Dave

 

[SamMarlowPI]

It's not so much the funky yellow on Milner's Deuce, but the chopped grille shell and the unchannelled body that screws the car up for me. The proportions on Idzardi's car are just so much more on.

As far as Falfa's car, while the '55 gasser is cool (although the 396-427-454 engines weren't out until 1965), I think that having a factory muscle car challenging the homebuilt hot rod makes a much stronger statement about the end of the hot rod era and the beginning of "bought rodding." It would be all the better if the car still had dealer plates on it.

have to remember that this was set in '62 where kids didn't have brand new cars, like a '62 impy, and all their money(milner and falfa) went into hot rodding whatever car they got their hands on, hence the reason we see the kids driving around in '32, '55, '58, '56, '29 and don't see them in anything new...just like today where the average teenager that can drive, unless wealthy, have older cars or use their parents cars and hod rod or "tune" whatever they can get like civics and whatnot...anyway i'm off topic here, another of my favorites is from a contemporary(and not the greatest of films) film with an older car: Highwaymen and the '68 'Cuda SS

 

[Liz]

Norma Desmond's Isotta Fraschini, no question. I've been obsessed with that car since the first time I saw Sunset Boulevard.

 

[Doh!]

When I was a kid, I had the Corgi version of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang:

 

[Tomasso]

Norma Desmond's Isotta Fraschini, no question. I've been obsessed with that car since the first time I saw Sunset Boulevard.

Yes, that's a very cool ride. I posted it on the Favorite Cars of the Golden Era thread.

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[SamMarlowPI]

that is a beautiful car...

 

[RIOT]

For me, I would have to say any Barris made kustom, most specially the Dragula.

 

[Jerekson]

Oh yeah, what do you folks think of the Munster-mobile?

 

[SamMarlowPI]

 

[Chas]

Bob Mitchum's ride in "Thunder Road"

 

[SamMarlowPI]

Bob Mitchum's ride in "Thunder Road"

oh dang i forgot about that car...my father and i love that '50 Ford and the film that goes along with it...

 

[David Conwill]

Bob Mitchum's ride in "Thunder Road"

It's been a long, long time since I've seen that movie (I was probably 8 or 9 years old). Is that an overhead valve engine in the '50? Perhaps a Y-block?

Gosh, anything with three two-barrels is all right with me! Interestingly, they look like they might be Holley 94s rather than the ubiquitous Stromberg 97s (fuel inlets appear to be into the tops of the float bowls, rather than the side).

As for Milner and Falfa, you're probably right that Falfa was intended to be a younger man. However, since I know that Harrison Ford was about 30 when AG was made, I've always felt like he was meant to be an older guy with money rather than some kid. Of course, Paul LeMat was no spring chicken, either.

More of my bias probably also comes from my father. His first car was a nearly-new '64 Plymouth Sport Fury with a hot, hot 426 Wedge (see below) and he never thought much of the early hot rods as performance cars (aesthetically speaking, he really enjoys them to this day, however).

Dad's Sport Fury

In any case, if Lucas didn't intend a muscle-cars-displacing-the-homebuilts theme with the movie, I think he missed an excellent idea.

Sorry to be cluttering up this excellent thread with off-topic banter, but I'm selfishly enjoying the debate.

-Dave

 

[SamMarlowPI]

In any case, if Lucas didn't intend a muscle-cars-displacing-the-homebuilts theme with the movie, I think he missed an excellent idea.

Sorry to be cluttering up this excellent thread with off-topic banter, but I'm selfishly enjoying the debate.

-Dave

i've heard and read he was mainly showing the "innocence", for lack of better terms, of the 50's and early 60's before overall change of face with "British Invasion" and Vietnam when cruising kind of faded out...

 

[J. M. Stovall]

The Dodge Challenger in Phantasm is always one of my favorites. I was more interested in the car than the movie when I saw it back in the 70's.

 

[SamMarlowPI]

I was more interested in the car than the movie...

happens to me all the time...
i liked the strange Fury in Thunderbolt And Lightfoot:

 

[The Wingnut]

Ahh, '73, the last good year for the Fury.

...and a bizarre vehicle to bastardize in such a manner. Fun to listen to and watch, right up until it rolls over(oh, God, the pain!).

I'm still wondering where in the hell he got all of those rabbits...although half of 'em were probably born right in the trunk.