Solid Block of Ise

There are several really cool cars in the world of movies. I decided to list the top ten in my opinion coolest cars that ever thundered across the screen. The criteria set was that it had to be a car (no motorcycles, boats or such) and that it had to be contained within the world of the big-screen - no TV-series cars! This quickly turned out to require quite a lot of thinking and consulting my movie-collection in order to find the top ten cars of movies - but I succeded and here they’re presented in reverse order.

Buckle your seatbelts, here we go!

10. 1973 Oldsmobile Delta 88 (Essentially every Sam Raimi-movie ever produced.)

Unfortunately I couldn’t locate a decent picture of this car, but it’s well-known to fans of Sam Raimis movies. As most people know, Sam started off directing somewhat weird horror-comedies (Evil Dead) and gradually upgraded himself to hollywood-blockbusters such as the Spider-man-movies.

Back to the car though. We who have loved Sams stranger works are well acquainted with the beige Olds for many years. It’s first appearance was as the car that brought Ash and his girlfriend to that evil little cabin in the woods. The car itself belonged to Sam Raimi himself, and rumor has it that the same exact car (or at the very least the same model) makes appearances in every movie Sam has directed since then. Personally I haven’t been able to confirm this, but I know for a fact that it has cameos in many of his movies - among them Spider-Man from 2002.

Trivia: The third and so far last part of the Evil Dead-series of movies (Army of Darkness) told the story of how the powers of the Necronomicon transports Ash to the dark ages. He didn’t go there alone, however - the beige Olds was also sucked into the vortex. There’s a very memorable scene in which Ash opens the trunk of the Olds, and it is briefly shown to contain everything from chemistry-books to bottles of Coca-Cola. What makes this extra hilarious is that word around the campfire has this to be the actual contents of what was in the trunk at the time of the filming.

9. Lotus Esprit (The Spy Who Loved Me)

I know that this skirts the definitions (no boats, etc) I laid out in the beginning, but this is such a cool car I had to include it. The Esprit is in my opinion one of the truly classic sportscars from the ’70’s, but Bonds version is of course not just a car - it’s also a submarine! My personal opinion is that this car is the only reason to watch an otherwise rather forgettable Bond-movie. Keep in mind though that it’s just my personal opinion, so all you James Bond-fans don’t have to flame me all at once!

Lotus is these days one of the few car-makers who have managed to avoid being swallowed by one of the multinational conglomerates and thereby stay independent. Even Jaguar and Aston-Martin got swallowed by the corporations. Jaguar is as far as I know still owned by Ford, Bentley is owned by VW and Rolls-Royce by BMW!

According to what I’ve managed to find there were three vehicles used to film the famous going-into-the-water-scene. The first one was an Esprit that had been modified to allow it to drive into the water without damaging the driver or the car. This vehicle was used for the scenes showing the car going into our out of the water. The second was built to show the transformation from car to submarine and served no other purpose than as a special-effect. The third was a small submarine by the name of Margie Dixon who had undergone surgery to look like the Esprit in submarine-version. The car was nicknamed “Wet Nellie” by the filmmakers, in a reference to the autogyro that Bond received from Q in “You Only Live Twice“.

There was also a completely normal Esprit used for road-scenes, which Roger Moore would drive between takes.

8. Ford Crown Victoria (Men In Black)

I found the first movie about the Men In Black very enjoyable. Contrasting to many other I found the sequel equally and even more enjoyable, I felt that it kept what “worked” and discarded everything else. Tommy Lee Jones is wonderful as the terse and laconic agent working for a organization monitoring and policing legal aliens on planet earth.

At one part in the film Jay (Will Smith) makes wise-cracks about how MiB has access to all the advanced technology from around the galaxy yet insists on cruising around in a “Ford P.O.S” (P.O.S. of course being in reference to the slang-term “piece of shit”). These jokes take an abrupt end when Jay is instructed to press the little red button, and the otherwise ordinary and mundane Ford transforms into a rocket-powered monster surging through the city at the speed of sound while Kay listens to old Elvis-songs.

Memorable quote:

Jay: You do know that Elvis is dead?
Kay: No, he’s not. He just went home.

(Apologies for the quality of the image)

7. Eleanor (Gone in 60 Seconds)

“Eleanor” is the nickname of the heavily modified 1967 Ford Mustang Shelby GT500 who is one of the cars in the remake of Gone In 60 Seconds from 2000. In the original movie from 1974 she was a Ford Mustang Mach1 Coupe, but I always like the remake-version much better.

The movie was a fairly big success among the fans, even though it proved to be a disappointment financially. Eleanor managed to become both a cult-car as well as a big celebrity. The demand for Eleanor-mustangs after the film was released was enormous, and this was made even worse that the car only existed on the movie-screen. Several Shelby GT500’s were custom-built for the movie, and all of them were destroyed when filming ended to prevent unauthorized sales of the cars.

Unique Performance realized the potential and developed a system where they bought old Mustangs and converted them to Eleanor-replicas. You can call them up and order one, provided you’re loaded with cash and have a lot of patience - each replica is hand-built to order. The price of a replica is unknown, but as the saying goes - if you have to ask what it costs you probably can’t afford it.

6. Bluesmobile (Blues Brothers)

It should be pointed out that the movie establishes that this car isn’t really the actual bluesmobile. Elwood traded it away for a microphone before the timeline of the movie, and according to the movie it apparently was a black Cadillac of unknown year or model.

But for every other fan of this movie this is the real deal, and the only Bluesmobile to ever exist.

According to what I’ve managed to dig up a grand total of 14 (!) black-and-white Dodge Monaco ’74s were used. This was needed since the movie had several spectacular stunts and each vehicle had to be built for a certain purpose. Vehicles that went fast, vehicles that could jump high - all were needed. In fact, one of the cars was built only to literally fall to pieces when so required!

Blues Brothers held the record for number of cars smashed in one movie for several years. It wasn’t until it’s own (somewhat less excellent) sequel was released that this record was broken. The main reason behind the over-the-top car-chases was partly based on the attempt to create really outrages chases, but also in order to lampoon earlier movies such as Bullitt or The French Connection.

Apart from the stunts this the movie is extremely entertaining thanks to the numerous musical numbers and cameos from famous musicians.

5. ECTO-1 (Ghostbusters)

ECTO-1 is the car that Ghostbusters cruised around in. It served as the company car for their business providing service of the same name. Occasionally referred to as the “Ectomobile”, although I’ve always felt that the correct name is ECTO-1, just as the license-plate says. The name is a derivative of the substance left behind by supernatural beings - ectoplasm.

The actual vehicle is a Cadillac Miller-Meteor with a loading dock in the rear. It’s a 1959 year, and this type of car mostly serviced as either ambulances or hearses. In the movie it’s bought by Ray Stanz for the ludicrous amount of US$4800 - completely absurd considering this would be about US$10.000 for a car that barely runs under it’s own power.

But after some heavy modification it became an 80’s icon. Almost anyone who lived during that decade remembers the Ghost Busters and their white car with the funky equipment.

Currently there’s a Ecto-1 replica for sale, asking price is around US$150.000. This is not the original car, but a replica built by renown car-customizer George Barris. Barris is among others the man who built the original Batmobile, used in the campy series from the 60’s, and he’s also well-known for falsely claiming to be involved in building and designing the original Ecto-1.

Trivia: Ecto-1 was originally supposed to be jet-black, but since a majority of scenes take place at night this meant the car would be almost invisible. The crew instead chose to go with the white paintjob and the red wings.

4. Batmobile (Batman, 1989)

The first time I saw Tim Burtons take on Batman I was 11 years old and watched it in the local grindhouse. Almost immediately it became one of my most loved movies ever, and the Batmobile presented in the movie was a major contributor to this fact. Previously I had only seen the Batmobile in the cheezy 60’s series, and even though that vehicle had a certain charm it couldn’t compare to the roaring beast in Tim Burtons interpretation.

No, this was a radically different kind of car. It was long, dark and voice-controlled. The looks combined the sleek elegance of sportscars from the 30’s with a jet-black exterior and extreme performance. Just like the Gotham City presented in the film it was dark, powerful and dangerous.
Various rumours insist that every single gadget on the car was fully functional - this included the extremely powerful gas turbine powering the vehicle. According to this rumour the gas turbine consumed fuel at such a rate that the car could only be driven for about 15 seconds. Personally I’m very skeptical to the validity of these rumours, but it would’ve been neat if it was true.

A few years ago I read an article about some guy in Stockholm who was building his own exact replica of this Batmobile. He constructed it on a custom chassis with a Chrysler V8 for power and some kind of rocket-engine for looks. This vehicle was of course completely road-illegal but apparently it never stopped this guy from occasional night-time cruises around the city preventing crime.

When watching the movies it seems as if the Batmobile is more like driving a boat than a car since it has a gas-throttle instead of a shifter. The car also makes an appearance in the sequel from 1991, where it’s nefariously sabotaged by The Penguin.

Unfortunately the Batmobile descended into a swamp of silliness when Joel Schumacher took over the helm. At least until…

3. The Tumbler (Batman Begins)

Yup, that’s right! Until Chris Nolan took over and re-invented the franchise. The Batmobile is the only car to nab two spots on this list, and this is solely thanks to it existing in so many different incarnations.

The vehicle presented to us in Batman Begins is more inspired by the vehicle driven by Batman in the “Dark Knight Returns” comics by Frank Miller. In that comic the “Batmobile” is more of an ironic and darkly humorous description for a huge tank. Rather than wheels it’s equipped with gigantic caterpillar tracks and easily crushes everything in it’s path.

So, it was obvious to most Batman-fans that was the catalyst for the re-invented Batmobile. In this movie the Batmobile is the result of a secret project conducted by Wayne Enterprises prior to Bruce Wayne becoming Batman. It was designed as a bridging vehicle, to jump across rivers and quickly erect bridges. They never got the bridge-part to work, but the Tumbler worked just fine. Bruce Wayne acquires the vehicle and presto! The new Batmobile is ready - even though it’s never referred to as such in the movie.

Chris Nolan was very specific about how he wanted to shoot the vehicle. He wouldn’t accept any CGI since he felt it wouldn’t look authentic, and thus a total of six cars was built for the various stunts. Two of them were full-scale and completely drivable, these were used for the road-scenes. The other four were built in smaller scales to shoot the jumps and roof-top chases.

Memorable dialogue:

Radio dispatcher: “What street is he taking?”
Cop in cruiser: “He’s not on a street, he’s flying on rooftops!”

Confused cop in patrol-car to dispatcher: “Could you just tell me what it looks like?”
(Tumbler roars past)
Cop: “Uh, never mind!”

2. Pursuit Special (Mad Max)

In 1979 a young Mel Gibson made his debut on movie-screens across the globe in what would become a cult-movie. That movie was Mad Max and painted a dystopian vision of an Australia in a not-too-distant future where the bad guys outnumbered the heroic cops. Mel Gibson portrayed Max, the terse and somewhat bitter cop who makes himself an enemy of a motorcycle gang, and loses not only his family but also most of his soul and purpose in life as a result.

Mad Max and especially it’s two sequels are well-known for two things - amazing car-chases and outrageous stunts. Even if the first sequel (The Road Warrior) introduced a slightly deeper western-derived story the car-chases were always the main attraction for viewers. Right in the middle was Max and his legendary vehicle: the black Pursuit Special.

The Pursuit Special (or as it’s sometimes called: “the last of the V8 Interceptors”) started it’s life as a fairly ordinary australian musclecar from the early 70’s. It’s a Ford Falcon XB GT Coupe, but it wasn’t until it got transformed into the Pursuit Special that it began it’s life in fame. Several modifications were made to the car, and during filming of The Road Warrior it was extensively modified as well, with among other things huge gas-tanks to fit into the fuel-starved australian desert where the movie takes place. Several of the modifications were however completely estetic and served no other purpose than looking badass. The huge supercharger sticking out of the hood is the most visual example of this, since it was completely non-functional.

The Mad Max-trilogy set most of the standard for many movies taking place in a post-apocalyptic future. Practically every movie in this genre since then has emulated some aspect of Mad Max or it’s sequels. The most obvious is Kevin Costers watery epic “Waterworld” which by many (including me) is essentially The Road Warrior but on water rather than in the desert. Unfortunately it also lacks everything that made the Mad Max-trilogy so awesome.

Pursuit Special served in two movies. Originally sold after the first movie wrapped it was re-acquired and showed up in the first sequel. The second sequel has no Pursuit Special in it, unfortunately. After that the car survived various tours among private collectors and then ended up in the Cars of the Stars-museum in the UK, where it can be seen together with among others the General Lee from the Dukes of Hazzard.

****DRUMROLL****

1. DeLorean DMC-12 (Back to the Future-trilogy)

That’s right! Doc Browns car from the Back To The Future-movies is without a doubt the coolest movie-car ever! This is not the first time that car receives that accolade, various other polls and such around the net concurs with my opinion. Personally I cannot think of a car that beats this one - not only does it look amazing but it also travels through time as well!

In the movies the time-machine is based on a DeLorean DMC-12 from 1981. When BTTF was in pre-production the original plan was that Doc Brown built his time-machine into a refrigerator! This was scrapped when the producers got worried that kids might try to mimic this, climb into their fridges and then get locked inside. The obvious replacement was a car of some kind.

Like Doc Brown himself also points out:

“The way I see it if you’re gonna build a time-machine, why not do it with some style!?”

Also, again according to Doc Brown, the cars stainless steel-body was advantageous for the flux dispersal. That’s always nice.

The choice of the Delorean was also influenced by the movies plot combined with how the Delorean looked. The producers felt that if a Delorean went back to the ’50s the futuristic styling of the car would make it look like a spaceship, and this added to the anachronistic tone of the film. The numbers for how many cars were used varies depending on source, but according to the comments track on the DVD’s a total of four were used. Three of them were built and used during filming, of which one got smashed in front of the freight-train. A fourth got chopped open to allow filming inside of the vehicle.

In the three films the time-machine goes through several changes. At the end of the first film it’s undergone hover-conversion and equipped with a fusion-reactor since providing plutonium for each trip proved to be a giant headache. In the second film it got stolen and used to alter the timeline, and in the beginning of the third film it was discovered in an abandoned mine after having rested there for more than 70 years. It also got struck by lightning several times, as well as being chased by both indians as well as the cavalry.

The sad fate of the time-machine was however to be smashed by a freight-train, but before that happened it gave us three wonderful movies filled with paradoxes, time-travelling, comedy and plenty of insanity.

Despite it’s own coolness the DMC-12 was never very successful as an automobile. It was heavily plagued by several engineering errors and planning mistakes. In the movie Marty bumps his head repeatedly on the gullwing doors, something that also was common for real-life owners. Add to this that the car was equipped with a badly under-performing engine which in the US version didn’t exceed more than 130 BHP. It was a common problem as well that the heavy doors (filled with stereo-components, electronics and airconditing equipment) would lock it’s owner out of the car due to the pistons holding up the doors being under-engineered. Another common occurrence was the draining of the cars battery if said doors were left open too long; this was due to the decision to use halogen-lights for doorlighting, and the thirsty bulbs would quickly drain the battery giving the driver a nasty surprise.

Trivia: The original script used a test-demolition of a nuclear bomb as the means by which Marty manages to get the 1.21 gigawatt required to activate the flux-capacitor. The Delorean would drive into the explosion, and this would charge the circuits and send Marty back to 1985. Steven Spielberg and the other producers felt however it would be unreasonably expensive to film, as well as difficult to produce convincingly as a special effect. Instead the producers opted for the lighting-strike.

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Contender that just didn’t make the cut: the APC from Aliens. That was also a really nifty car - the neatest feature probably was that it was bigger inside than outside!

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There, that summarizes my top-ten list of the most amazing movie-cars ever. The overwhelming deduction one can make from this list is that most of the really cool movie-cars appear in films from the 80’s.

Disclaimer: This list is almost exclusively based on my own personal opinions. I’ve tried to research the facts presented here to the best of my ability, but any errors or omissions is my own fault. Most of the facts come from my own personal trivia-center inside my head, and I’ve tried to confirm them as best as possible. Others come from around the net, but apart from chasing down the producers of each film and asking obscure questions this is most likely as good as it’ll get.

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(This is a translation and slight update/rewrite of my earlier Swedish-language posting from back in May ‘07. I feel that there’s a lot of writings in my previous three years that might be enjoyable to people who don’t understand the language. Postings that I’m a little extra proud of, and thus I’ve started translating a few of them for your questionable enjoyment.)

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