To be honest, I can’t think of many Hollywood car scenes that aren’t ridiculous. From the durability of the cars and the laws of physics under which they operate, to the performance capabilities depicted and the (lack of a) toll taken on the drivers, virtually every action scene that puts protagonist and antagonist on four wheels is likely to trip my baloneyometer to varying degrees.
Now, I’m not one to come out of a Star Wars showing and smugly decree, “There’s no sound in space,” and likewise, I am generally unbothered by some artistic automotive license in the interest of keeping the action and the cars moving even when a real-world car would have undoubtedly been immobilized. But there are limits!
One film in particular that irked me deeply was the 2000 remake of Gone In 60 Seconds, wherein Nic Cage plays car-thief extraordinaire “Memphis Raines” and mugs through 120 minutes of car-thieving action that I have entirely forgotten, with the exception of the final plot-capping stunt.
The whole movie builds to Cage making a spectacular leap in the famous Eleanor Mustang (a car I’ve always found it kinda meh, but whatever), and being made in the year 2000, the expectation is that an insane real-car stunt is about to explode across the screen, hopefully in a nice wide shot. But no! We get a quick-cut mess that makes it impossible to appreciate the death-defying action, and worse, everything between the Mustang hitting the ramp and nailing the landing is crappy CGI, completely removing any excitement the sequence could have delivered.
After two hours of slick junk-movie crap, being deprived of a real stunt genuinely pissed me off. Adding insult to injury was that the film expects the audience – many members of which have likely seen or experienced how much damage even a 20-mph crash can do – to accept that a 1967 Mustang can fly what appears to be 100 feet in the air, at least two stories high, then land and keep going. All four tires holding air, frame straight, hood unbuckled, nothing falling off. Speaking of unbuckled: “Memphis” is not wearing a seatbelt during all of this, and not only is his spine not crushed, but he remains squarely seated for the duration. Sure. I mean, this kind of nonsense with the Duke Boys leaping a pond is one thing, but a 100-foot sky-shot across the Brooklyn Bridge (I think)? Come on man.
I also have problems with Batmobiles. Not the 1966 Futura version, that one gets a pass as it existed in a completely unreal camp fantasy. No, it’s the Burton/Schumacher and Nolan Batmobiles that bug me. They’re cool and all, but when such a big hook for these films is (to varying degrees) “gritty, realistic Batman,” the impossibility and dumbness of the ‘mobiles bugs me.
As Batman and Vicky Vale scramble away from whatever, Bats whisper-shouts “shields!” and the Batmobile stop-motion deploys an armored shell. From nowhere. You can see it there above. Where are those panels coming from? Where do they go? Why does the Batmobile need them? Isn’t it bulletproof? Can’t Bruce – er, Batman – just lock it?
The Nolan “Tumbler” is much more plausible than 1989’s land-speed-record Batmobile, and the in-universe origin of the car is a scuttled Wayne Tech military vehicle project. OK, I buy that. What I don’t buy is the thing ejecting its front wheels and somehow configuring them as a motorcycle – a motorcycle that Bats mounts while still inside the Tumbler, somehow. Go ahead, just try and make the whole thing make sense as a military concept first, then try to imagine how it would work. Good luck.
Your turn:
Outside Of The Fast & Furious Films, What Hollywood Car Scene Was Just Too Ridiculous For You?
(Note, you can totally mention the F&F films. I just put that in there to let you off the hook if you wanted to set them aside, because they are wall-to-wall bananas.)
(Top Image: Bruce Wayne Estate (just kidding, it’s Warner Bros.)
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