Somehow I forgot to acknowledge June 5th this year. I really should have recognized it last year, because it marked forty years since one of the biggest tragedies of the eighties. No, it wasn’t a natural disaster or death of a celebrity; this was something far worse.
This was the day in 1985 that Katie Bueller lost the Vermont deal, and it was all Jeannie’s fault.
She had good reason to make a stir, though. Nobody believed her when she tried to prove that her brother was faking illness to get out of school and go on a Chicagoland adventure that showed off a wide variety of malaise-era automobiles. As with most John Hughes movies, the cars really helped shape this iconic film by being characters themselves; I’ve explored this before with another Hughes film, The Breakfast Club. Some are perfectly cast, others I’d change, but they’re all worth a deeper dive.
1978 Alfa Romeo Sport Sedan
Looking back, Ferris Bueller was kind of a jerk. He bothers his legitimately sick friend Cameron to come over and play with him on his day of truancy (though some claim that Ferris doesn’t exist at all and is really a Brad-Pitt-in-Fight-Club alter ego to feeble Cameron). Cameron will respond to Ferris’s whims and, more importantly, has a car.
Likely handed down from Cameron’s Italian-car-loving dad, Ferris describes this vehicle as a piece of sh*t. It is, but it’s also probably the coolest of the cars I’ll explore here and easily the one you’d choose out of this lot to take onto a Lime Rock Track Day. It’s a 1978 Alfa Sport Sedan, the terrible name for the American version of the Alfetta Berlina. Younger readers will wonder how a then-seven-year-old Alfa could be so shot and rust-rimmed, but anyone living in the Midwest then will wonder how it survived those winters at all.
Ignore the boxy looks; with a twin-cam four and rear-mounted transaxle, it’s the same drivetrain as the GTV coupe. I’d assume it’s a four-speed, though you could get a slushbox; a choice akin to buying Neapolitan ice cream without chocolate. Getting that operatic-sounding motor started was likely a task akin to raising the spirit of Alberto Ascari every time you turned the key, but it would be worth it.
1961 Ferrari 250GT California Spyder (replica)
Ferris wants to pick up his girlfriend from Shermer High School (actually Glenbrook North in Northbrook, Illinois), and has disguised himself as her grandfather to facilitate her liberation. He deems the Alfetta not credible as a grandfather car, and goads Cameron into taking the keys to his father’s pride and joy, summoning him from the 1953 Ben Rose house in Highland Park designed by a student of Mies van der Rohe (Rose was, in fact, an exotic car collector himself).
The car was a 1961 Ferrari 250GT California Spyder stored in the glass garage next to the main house. The “Ferrari” was, of course, not the real thing but a kit car with a Ford V8 and automatic transmission. Reportedly, it was hated by all who drove it – when it ran, that is. Breakdowns were apparently common on the set.
Honestly, other than the real thing’s lovely Colombo V-12 engine noise, an actual 1961 250GT is likely horrible to drive by modern standards, but at a value of around $18 million today, it’s more Investment Object than car.
The pickup location at Glenbrook North is still there for long-suffering parents to wait for their kids to show up, including one that does dumb-ass posts for an ill-publicized website.
A brand-new elementary school has sprouted up across the street, but otherwise it’s as if Rooney is still standing at the top of the steps (and that’s the auditorium, so realistically he wouldn’t have been coming out there).
1985 Pontiac Fiero 2M4
Ferris’s sister inexplicably received a car for her birthday while Ferris only got a computer, even though back then a desktop machine likely cost more than a beat-up Nova. However, Jeannie didn’t get a hooptie; she drove an early Fiero.
Sure, with the Iron Duke it was probably awful, but for posing you couldn’t top pulling up in that plastic-bodied Pontiac; it still looks good.
Jeannie must have looked cool cruising around fictitious Shermer (it’s really Northbrook) in her mock sports car, but then again nobody puts Baby in a corner. I hope she checked the oil regularly.
1985 Plymouth Reliant
The arch nemesis of Ferris is Ed Rooney, Dean of Students at Shermer High. He drives a K-Car Plymouth Reliant, a car that even then told the world that you’d given up on your dreams.
It’s a perfect car for a public-school educator of the day; my guess is that he had a 1974 Dodge Dart with a Slant 6 before that, just like the librarian at your elementary school. He lucked out by not having bought a Volare.
1985 Audi 5000 Turbo
We know that Ferris’s father has a well-paying job in The Loop downtown. His car of choice is an Audi 5000 S Turbo, the aerodynamic American version of the third-generation 200 that got stiffed with awful rectangular headlights at first. This was in the final days of the big Audis being considered desirable by the masses before 60 Minutes rigged up an earlier to accelerate out of control with all of its 100 horsepower. Values fell off a cliff.
The car is well cast and shows Mr. Bueller to be a relatively high-level white-collar employee but not a take-no-prisoners, ruthless President-level C-suite guy. If that were the case, he’d be in an E23 7-series BMW or a W126 Mercedes 300SD with a diesel motor that sounds like it’s churning rocks.
Note the “Mr Mom” license plate; all of John Hughes’ movies have cars with tags featuring references to his other films.
1985 Chrysler LeBaron Town & Country Wagon
Now, here’s one that I take issue with. There is no way that Ferris’s real estate agent mom would be driving a dopey Chrysler LeBaron Town & Country wagon. Note the “Vacation” plate.
Even in period, we all knew this thing was stupid; undersized to a fault when Iacocca thought gas was going to be five bucks a gallon by 1985.
A far more accurate choice for the North Shore then and today would have been a Volvo; a 7-series estate back then.
If we were going to stay American, I’d go with a “real” full-sized woody wagon like a B-body Oldsmobile Custom Cruiser or a Panther-body Mercury Grand Marquis Colony Park wagon, like the one my family owned.
Seriously, Mrs. Bueller didn’t stand a chance in the Vermont deal with a friggin K-car.
Like most John Hughes productions, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off is not a great movie by any film historian’s standards, but it’s inextricably part of the fabric of our eighties youth. Living only a few miles from the water tower once emblazoned with SAVE FERRIS means it’s something I can’t help but remember, and as an Autopian, that includes the now-classic cars in the film.
As Ferris said, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”
Top graphic images: Paramount Pictures
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