WHAT DAD REALLY WANTS FOR CHRISTMAS...
In his heart of hearts, Dad actually wants a real muscle car or truck to drive, depending on where he might live, to use right away or about five months from now. But unless he’s Ted Turner or Bill Gates, he’s unlikely to get one.
And I won’t leave Moms out either. I imagine a few would also like to explore that feeling of getting into a powerful, jacked-up vehicle and letting her rip. A few might even use the opportunity to mow down their husbands, re-living that whole “Thelma and Louise” ride. What a way to go.
A less pricey present for most any red-blooded male (and females too, judged on a case-by-case basis), is a customized set of the best high-speed vehicle movies ever made. If you can’t really be behind that wheel, then feel you are. Vroooooom.
The automobile and its various offshoots, those gas-guzzling, defining innovations of the twentieth century, are as integral to movies as they are to our daily routines. Since films are the magic mirror held up to our everyday lives, “with the dull bits left out” (Alfred Hitchcock), this only makes sense. And they are also what was coined in advertising “high-involvement” decisions- for the price tag, but also because what we drive makes a big statement about who we are as individuals: our stations in life, priorities, characters, and importantly, taste.
My own selection criteria for this piece: I have said “Best” in my title, which means that a film that does not stand as great on its own four wheels, won’t cut it. This takes me to the tricky area of the cult film. “Vanishing Point” (1971) with Barry Newman, “Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry” (1974) with Peter Fonda, and “Smokey and the Bandit” (1977) with Burt Reynolds, are undeniably fun to watch for us speed freaks, but none could be categorized as stand-alone great films in my playbook.
One heretofore elusive entry that’s coming out on DVD in time for Christmas is “Two Lane Blacktop” (1971), a movie I somehow let speed away from me. Yes, folks-I’ve simply never seen it. Whether it transcends cult status to achieve greatness is a process of discovery I anticipate with enthusiasm. The title has one-er, two- possible debits going in- James Taylor and Dennis Wilson in the cast (musicians as actors? Dicey, excluding Crosby and Sinatra). But “Two-Lane” also has one major advantage: Warren Oates, a rare character-and character actor.
Before displaying my list (in ascending order of preference), I give another nod to Mr. Hitchcock. He did not do strictly high-chase films, but as master of the sweaty palm school of film-making, cars at high-speeds did make appearances. Characteristically, he executed a subtle twist on the expected: he had the woman scaring the blazes out of the man. That man was Cary Grant, and the women (can you guess?): Ingrid Bergman in “Notorious”(1946), and Grace Kelly in “To Catch A Thief”(1955). (Notably, this precise set-up was recreated in the James Bond entry “Thunderball” (1965), where the usually unflappable Sean Connery looks quite uncomfortable being squired about at over 100 MPH by one of the sexiest Bond women ever: the busty, fiery-maned Luciana Paluzzi.)
Now, fast down the track, come my own top ten high-speed vehicle movies.
10) Duel (1971) - David Mann (Dennis Weaver, TV's "McCloud") is your typical traveling salesman having the least typical of road trips. Impatient to reach his destination, David passes an enormous, smoke-spewing truck on the road, and from then on, can't shake the vehicle, which has a nasty, destructive personality all its own. Steven Spielberg's first full length film remains a grabber. Absent his later big Hollywood budgets, the director's knack for building tension is still evident, creating a spare, ingenious thriller. Weaver excels as the rattled David, who should stay off the road!
9) Speed (1988) - Madman Howard Payne (Dennis Hopper) wreaks havoc in Los Angeles, strapping a bomb under a municipal bus set to go off if the acceleration goes under 50 mph. Annie Porter (Sandra Bullock) is one unlucky woman on the bus due to too many speeding tickets. Officer Jack Travern ( Keanu Reeves) is the LAPD bomb expert who must rescue the passengers. Though I may quibble with both Reeves' and Hopper's performances (the first acts like scenery, the second chews it), “Speed” was not intended as an actors’ showcase. Instead, it's one long adrenaline rush with enough twists and turns to sustain its running time, certain to keep action fans glued for the whole ride.
8) Rebel Without A Cause (1955) - Picked up on a minor charge, new kid in town Jim (James Dean) is taken to the same police station as Judy ( Natalie Wood), a high-school girl running in a fast crowd, and Plato (Sal Mineo), a lonely rich kid desperate for attention. Disaffected and alienated from their families, these three lost souls become a close-knit pack, particularly after Judy's hot-rodding boyfriend maneuvers Jim into a high-risk hot rod race. Nicholas Ray's "Rebel" cemented James Dean's reputation as the embodiment of the restless, disillusioned teen, chafing against the suffocating conservatism of mid-century American society with raw force. Meanwhile the budding Wood (leaving her child star roles in this pivotal part), the painfully vulnerable Mineo, and Jim Backus (as Dean's spineless father), round out an ideal cast. It’s a bitter irony that Dean raced cars in real life, and lost his life in one, way too soon after this.
7) The Road Warrior (1981) - In a bleak, post-apocalyptic world where gasoline is worth more than gold, former cop Max (Mel Gibson) drifts the outback. Led to a small community of survivors operating an oil refinery under the leadership of Pappagallo (Mike Preston), Max reluctantly helps them deflect attacks by a band of marauding, petrol-hungry clans. A sequel to "Mad Max," this gripping, hyperkinetic film not only stands on its own, but throttles past its predecessor. Gibson, reprising his role as Max, is all nerve and bone as the rugged, laconic loner, and his visceral performance has star power written all over it. George Miller's "Road Warrior" remains one continuous action/sci-fi bonanza, epitomized in the climactic scene involving a band of crazed villains pursuing an oil tanker at breakneck speed. Fasten your seat belts indeed.
6) American Graffiti (1973) - One night in the summer of 1962, a group of California teenagers meet after a school dance for one last cruise in the valley. In a series of vignettes, we track momentous happenings in the lives of thoughtful, strait-laced Steve (Ron Howard) and his brainy pal Curt (Richard Dreyfuss), both of whom have misgivings about leaving home for college. Meanwhile, Curt's sister Laurie (Cindy Williams) doesn't want the same things out of life as Steve, her long-time boyfriend. Cut to a sock-hop soundtrack by Wolfman Jack, George Lucas’s "Graffiti" presents a crisp, nostalgic evocation of teen restlessness, with a stellar, soon-to-be-famous cast including Dreyfuss, Mackenzie Phillips, and Paul LeMat. Almost like no other film, “Graffiti” also glorifies the potent symbol of the automobile- particularly the fast ones- in that special time and place. Watch for the race between Le Mat and a still obscure actor playing a hot-shot, race-crazy hick: Harrison Ford.
5) Rendezvous (1976) - The only title you won’t find on our site (www.bestmoviesbyfarr.com) has nothing to do with its quality, only its quantity: the film is a short- just nine minutes long. Noted French director Claude Lelouch (“A Man and a Woman”) had the daring idea of strapping a camera to his 6.9 litre Mercedes and then traversing Paris at high speed, with no stops, at the crack of dawn. This little stunt actually led to Lelouch’s arrest ( eventually no charges were filed), and we, the speed-loving public, are its lasting beneficiaries. Rumor has it the director played with the engine sound- effects to boost perceived sense of speed, but it makes little difference. “Rendezvous” endures as a concentrated, breathless marvel, definitely worth the price of a speeding ticket.
4) Ronin (1998) - Sam (Robert De Niro), a veteran intelligence agent, joins a covert team for a lucrative assignment to seize a suitcase whose mysterious contents are coveted by both the Russian mafia and the IRA. This simple premise develops into countless twists and turns, double- and triple-crosses, along with some truly hair-raising car chase sequences. The late director John Frankenheimer takes a boilerplate idea and milks it for all its worth, constructing a tight, pounding thriller. Casting and performances are solid, but this truly is a director's picture, with Frankenheimer's keen sense of pacing and flavorful European locations contributing to an edge-of-your-seat experience.
3) Goldfinger (1964) - Racing from Miami to Europe, British agent James Bond (Sean Connery) attempts to foil Goldfinger (Gert Frobe), a notorious, ingot-hungry maniac with plans to detonate a nuclear device inside Fort Knox. But first he must outmaneuver the villain's evil sidekicks: sultry pilot Pussy Galore (Blackman) and bowler-hat-whirling Korean killer, Oddjob (Harold Sakata). Actually third in the series, Guy Hamilton's "Goldfinger" dispensed with the earnest conventions of the spy flick for something cheekier and loads more fun: arch quips, cartoonish enemies, and those exotic femme fatales. Perhaps most important, "Goldfinger" also introduces Bond's tricked-out Aston Martin, whose bullet proof shield rising behind the rear window and famous passenger side ejector seat made countless people of all ages (myself included) gape in wonder.
2) Bullitt (1968) - When hard-nosed Bay Area police detective Frank Bullitt (Steve McQueen) launches an inquiry into the murder of a Mob informant under his protection, he gets stymied by aspiring politician Walter Chalmers (Robert Vaughn), head of the Senate subcommittee investigating Mafia corruption. Undaunted, Bullitt pursues the underworld killers with dogged determination. A cop film which boasts one of the best car chases ever- an exhilarating, ten minute romp through the streets of San Francisco that's rarely been equaled. Pound for pound and minute by minute, "Bullitt" must be the quintessential McQueen movie. The action sequences are taut and nerve-jangling, and the distinctive McQueen persona - reticent, self-reliant, calm under pressure - is fully evoked. Of course, he had one undeniable advantage: he was the coolest movie star of his time, and so both he and "Bullitt" take a permanent place in our collective movie conscience.
1) The French Connection (1971) - "Connection" relates the fact-based story of narcotics detective Jimmy "Popeye" Doyle (Gene Hackman) and his partner Buddy Russo (Roy Scheider), who use unorthodox means to track down the source of an upcoming heroin influx to New York City. Their obsessive, hard-driving style leads them to a smooth French drug lord (Fernando Rey) attempting to smuggle in a huge shipment of dope from Europe. Hackman's electrifying performance as Popeye won him an Oscar and transformed him from supporting player to star overnight. Shot verité-style by William Friedkin, the film’s highlight occurs as Popeye, trying to nab an assassin, chases a subway train above him by car, traversing (or not) a variety of obstacles on the streets. I rate this as the most exciting chase sequence in film history.
RELATED: Best High Speed Vehicle Movies By Farr Video Entry [LINK]
