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 Five Star Car Stunts, Two Star Production
Values
Gone in 60 Seconds (1973)
H.B.Halicki (everything)
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Objectively speaking,
this is not a very good film.
The "acting" is mostly non-extant, and the dialogue sounds as if the
film was shot "wild" and later post-dubbed. The plot meanders in
several directions it didn't need to go.
That said, fans of car-chases will get their money's worth with this
one.
As has been pretty much beaten to death in other reviews, the basic
story involves a steal-to-order car-theft ring operating under the
ideal dual "fronts" of a junkyard (Halicki's own "Mercantile and Junk
Emporium", i'm sure -- seen in much more detail in his second film,
"The Junkman [q.v.]) and a firm of insurance-adjustors.
The opening half-hour or so is a sort of crash course in car theft
methods, as the gang takes a comission to steal 48 specific cars by a
certain deadline.
As we all know, as the deadline approaches, only "Eleanor" -- a yellow
1973 Ford Mustang Mach One -- remains unaccounted for.
And herein lies a joke that many, almost thirty years later, in a time
when the Mach One is a "classic", may fail to get -- in 1974, yellow
Mach Ones might not have been as common as VW Beetles, but they were
probably more common than, oh, say, 1973 MGB-GTs... So here they are,
having gotten all of the exotics -- including Lyle Waggoner's personal
Ferrari, for instance -- and they can't find an example that meets
their criteria-for-theft of a car that, at the time, was so common you
could count on seeing one or two a day in almost any city of any size.
(There is a funny sequence with an ironic payoff when they THINK
they've found the car they want, but have to put it back...)
And, of course, when they DO find "Eleanor", the chase, literally, is
on. Forty-odd minutes and 93 smashed cars later, Halicki puts the
battered but still gamely-rolling Eleanor through one of the single
most spectacular car stunts i have ever seen on film -- the flex and
twist in the body as it lands after The Jump, captured in slow-motion,
bear witness to the stress on both the car and the driver, as the tires
spin and smoke as he battles for control.
And, of course, the final gag in the car-wash is nicely ironic and
funny.
If nothing else, this film is a tribute and testimony to the power and
durability of Seventies Detroit Big Iron -- though i usually prefer the
subtlety of a European sports car, sometimes the only way to go is with
the sledge-hammer unsubtlety of Cubic Inches and bags and bags of
torque and oversteer.
So much better than the Nick Cage in-name-only remake that there's no
comparison.
Too bad about the DVD "remastered" soundtrack, though ((Someone's
suggestion that you find a copy of the original mono VHS release and
listen to that while watching the DVD sounds appropriately weird to
me.))
"Toby" Halicki was killed on the set of the abortive production of
"Gone in 60 Seconds II" in a freak, non-driving accident. Too bad; i'd
love to have seen what he could have done with a little more experience
and the bigger budgets he would probably have gotten as time went on.
Highly recommended, even if it doesn't have the original soundtrack. |
| The image at the top of this review is not
the cover image from the current video/DVD release; it is the one-sheet
for the original UK release in 1974. The new box art looks altogether
too much like the 2000 in-name-only "remake". |
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