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9/16/2020 6:49 AM  #1


Finally saw 'Bullitt'

1966 Mustang Coupe, 5.0 Swap, T5z

I had about a 2 hour conversation with a car guy in a bar parking lot on Monday night.  He used to race cars and had some pretty deep pockets from all the stories he told.  He made a reference to the 'Bullitt' b/c my mustang is the same 'Bullitt Green' and I was embarrassed to admit I had never seen it.  Movie was made 15 years before I was even born but I knew enough of the legendary status to recognize it's significance to the Mustang world.

Few Thoughts...
1) I was lead to believe the entire movie was about the car.  It doesn't even show up till an hour into a movie that is not even 2 hours long.  I wanted more car!  He takes a taxi twice in the movie.  Why didn't he just drive his car?  (Robert Duvall a bit character taxi driver.... somehow he looked old even when he was young.)

2) The car gets trashed?!?!?! What the hell?  Also, what is up w/ San Francisco streets?  Why all the jumps?

3) Car chase was pretty good.  It was nice to see real cars going real fast as opposed to all the computer graphics stuff of today.  If they re-made the movie today Vin Diesel would have driven it over a volcano or somehow taken it up to space.

4) For such a simple looking car, man did it look good.  I immediately started searching for 68 fastbacks.  Way out of my price range but I would love for that to be my next restoration project.  I definitely see why it's a head turner.  Made me appreciate my ride even more.

5) Movie was ok.  Pace of the movie seemed a little slow for a cop drama.  Come to think of it, the most memorable thing about the movie really was the car so I guess I get why it is regarded so highly.  

BTW, next on my list of movies to watch as a certified car guy is 'Smokey and the Bandit'.

 

9/16/2020 8:55 AM  #2


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

SF has a lot of up and down hills. The cross streets are are almost leveled into the the hills creating a ramp effect going up and down. You have to drive in SF to fully appreciate the feeling.

 

9/16/2020 8:59 AM  #3


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

I am sorta shocked when I "re-watch"(is that a word? ) an old movie I once thought was "GREAT'.
I usually axe myself,  "self,....how in the world could you have thought THIS was a great movie!?"

Back-in-da-day (before graffic magic) we viewed stuff with the normal-eye, so    Bullitt........French Connection........Dirty Mary Crazy Larry.......Vanishing Point... was very exciting!  Now days.......sorta hokey.
Glad you gotta look at how-it-was in the 60's.

After a visit to San Francisco I can certainly understand the flying cars scenes!  That is a very hilly town. (Too bad it's turned into a septic tank.......I would have loved another visit there)
6sally6


Get busy Liv'in or get busy Die'n....Host of the 2020 Bash at the Beach/The only Bash that got cancelled  )8
 

9/16/2020 11:45 AM  #4


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

ALL older movies are "slow" compared to today's action energy second flicks. At the time, I think the only other movie that had in car camera action was Grand Prix, a great classic flick, which I watched on Saturday.


Bob. 69 Mach 1, 393W, SMOD Toploader, Armstrong  steering, factory AC.
 

9/16/2020 12:34 PM  #5


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

If you never saw Bullet then maybe you should look for vanishing Point, I know its not a Ford but still a good movie


Slammed Big Blue, ran over the varmints that messed with the Stang. Now all is good in the NW
 

9/16/2020 1:24 PM  #6


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

The SF chase scene in Bullet was filmed from many angles and if you look closely you'll see the VW Bug numerous times (from different angles) during the chase. Great old school filmography that is lacking in movies today.
Todays chase/blowup/... scenes happen so fast it is impossible to keep up with the CGI that makes them. My head spins so many times in today's movies. 
Here is one of the chases where Bullet gets beat up pretty bad. 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vNvc9n1ikI

Last edited by RV6 (9/16/2020 1:24 PM)


Gary Zilik - Pine Junction, Colorado - 67 Coupe, 289-4V, T5
 

9/16/2020 2:09 PM  #7


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

I'd recommend Two-Lane Blacktop, it's different, but good in its own way.

 

9/16/2020 7:31 PM  #8


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

Yeah...........Bullitt still brings a smile to this old,wrinkled face (although still purity and near perfection in every way!)
  Prolly my 'favorite' scene is just before the chase starts.............the old guy in the  Dodge Charger is boxed in....in traffic.  He slips on the driving gloves and smashes the old Hurst shifter into 1st gear and commences to light up the  tires !! 

Side note..I use to work with a fella that was an absolute dead ringer  of the "hit man" in Bullitt.  (Baldish guy with the shot gun)
Henry looked soooo much like the guy we nicknamed him  "Henry-the-hit-man"
6sal6


Get busy Liv'in or get busy Die'n....Host of the 2020 Bash at the Beach/The only Bash that got cancelled  )8
 

9/16/2020 7:36 PM  #9


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

Hey TW..........please tell us you HAVE seen the  Ultimate/all time classic car flick..........American Graffitti!
If not .......you need to STOP what UR doing and go rent it.
Sooooo many young stars.... during prolly the best time for a car guy to have ever lived!!
6sal6


Get busy Liv'in or get busy Die'n....Host of the 2020 Bash at the Beach/The only Bash that got cancelled  )8
 

9/16/2020 9:18 PM  #10


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

6sally6 wrote:

Hey TW..........please tell us you HAVE seen the  Ultimate/all time classic car flick..........American Graffitti!
If not .......you need to STOP what UR doing and go rent it.
Sooooo many young stars.... during prolly the best time for a car guy to have ever lived!!
6sal6

I just gotta agree with you Sal.


Bob. 69 Mach 1, 393W, SMOD Toploader, Armstrong  steering, factory AC.
 

9/16/2020 9:51 PM  #11


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

TW,

Not Mustangs...
RONIN is a great car chase movie.

GREASE is an oldie but a goodie too...before Mustangs.

What can I say, I like cars.
I don’t know a heck of a lot about them.

FYI, if you “Drive the Streets of San Francisco”, do yourself a favor.
Make sure your battery clamp is in place.

My battery hit the original mechanical fan blade and drained one cell to the point it would not start.
I could jump it and it would run, just not start.

Second, don’t try to get air like in the movie.
Yeah, I learned something that evening.
I still haven’t forgotten...yet 😂

Last edited by Nos681 (9/16/2020 9:59 PM)

 

9/17/2020 6:08 AM  #12


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

TremendousWand wrote:

1966 Mustang Coupe, 5.0 Swap, T5z

I had about a 2 hour conversation with a car guy in a bar parking lot on Monday night.  He used to race cars and had some pretty deep pockets from all the stories he told.  He made a reference to the 'Bullitt' b/c my mustang is the same 'Bullitt Green' and I was embarrassed to admit I had never seen it.  Movie was made 15 years before I was even born but I knew enough of the legendary status to recognize it's significance to the Mustang world.

Few Thoughts...
1) I was lead to believe the entire movie was about the car.  It doesn't even show up till an hour into a movie that is not even 2 hours long.  I wanted more car!  He takes a taxi twice in the movie.  Why didn't he just drive his car?  (Robert Duvall a bit character taxi driver.... somehow he looked old even when he was young.)

2) The car gets trashed?!?!?! What the hell?  Also, what is up w/ San Francisco streets?  Why all the jumps?

3) Car chase was pretty good.  It was nice to see real cars going real fast as opposed to all the computer graphics stuff of today.  If they re-made the movie today Vin Diesel would have driven it over a volcano or somehow taken it up to space.

4) For such a simple looking car, man did it look good.  I immediately started searching for 68 fastbacks.  Way out of my price range but I would love for that to be my next restoration project.  I definitely see why it's a head turner.  Made me appreciate my ride even more.

5) Movie was ok.  Pace of the movie seemed a little slow for a cop drama.  Come to think of it, the most memorable thing about the movie really was the car so I guess I get why it is regarded so highly.  

BTW, next on my list of movies to watch as a certified car guy is 'Smokey and the Bandit'.

1.) That's a common misconception.  If you go into it with that mindset its disappointing.

2.) The idea was that the car was just a car.  Remember these cars were new, not rare, not valuable.  Its an instrument that Bullit is willing to use and if necessary wreck to "get his man".

3.) Its remains IMO the best car chase scene ever filmed.  The one in Ronin is also right up there.  Yeah, the FF movies at this point I term unwatchable.  I think the franchise underestimates the appeal of true to life action as opposed to absurdity, though with the kind of money they've made I guess its fair to say "what the hell do I know?"

4.) My '67 fastback was painted metallic green when I bough tit and had some of the trim stripped off.  I didn't get the car because I had seen the movie; it was really just dumb luck, but it is part of why those cars are so iconic today.

5.) If you watch it as a movie, and are pleasantly surprised by the awesome car chase scene its actually quite good.  Its from a different era of film making.  A modern audience, with its short attention span and need for constant dialogue views it as slow.  It wold never be considered "great" by today's mas audience standards.  One thing that surprises you is how long sections of the film go without anyone talking.  Its kind of the difference between a great novel and a Michael Chricton novel.  If you don't want to do any work I can just tel you everything.  If you're willing to work I can show you things that you have to pick up on your own.  That's not to be judgey or anything, both types of novels and films have their places.  There's nothing wrong with just wanting to be entertained.  Bullit just isn't meant to be just entertaining, or what people considered entertaining 50 years ago is just different than today. 
 

 

9/17/2020 6:12 AM  #13


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

Nos681 wrote:

TW,

Not Mustangs...
RONIN is a great car chase movie.

GREASE is an oldie but a goodie too...before Mustangs.

What can I say, I like cars.
I don’t know a heck of a lot about them.

FYI, if you “Drive the Streets of San Francisco”, do yourself a favor.
Make sure your battery clamp is in place.

My battery hit the original mechanical fan blade and drained one cell to the point it would not start.
I could jump it and it would run, just not start.

Second, don’t try to get air like in the movie.
Yeah, I learned something that evening.
I still haven’t forgotten...yet 😂

Those cars took a beating during the filming.  There were two of each type used and they had full time mechanics to repair them.  Part of the way the last Bullit car found was verified was the bracing used in it to allow it to survive those jumps.  I really liked the Dukes of Hazard movie they made some years back.  The movie itself was okay, but the best part was the end where they showed outtakes of what really happens to a car when you jump it like that.  First, there wasn't even anyone in the car; it was flung up a ramp by a mechanism.  Then it hops all over the road and smashes into other cars, trees, guardrails, etc.

 

9/17/2020 7:59 AM  #14


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

I'll probably catch hell about this, but in the first Transformers movie the cop car is one of the bad guys. There's a pretty good chase that goes on for a bit where the cop car chases the old Camaro (Bumblebee). I think the cop car was a Roush or Saleen supercharged setup as you can hear the whine. To me that was the most memorable scene in the movie, other than a few others that are not fit to discuss on a family friendly site

Last edited by Raymond_B (9/17/2020 8:01 AM)

 

9/17/2020 9:04 AM  #15


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

Since I (many of us here to) was in the audience when Bullitt firsted showed, I can tell you it "checked a lot of the boxes" as far as good movies back then.
1. It had a little  blood and gore to grab your interest (remember this was mid 60's)
2. Had a little touch of "skin" (I think?)
3. A hint of  sex
4. A no nonsense cop with law & order his ONLY interest (like Joe Friday or RPM
5. Cool chase scene
6. Good guys win in the end.
Simple plot......$$$ maker.....showcased a young good looking star (I'll bet the movie has millions more views since most of the starts are dead than when they were alive and kicking!!!
6sal6


Get busy Liv'in or get busy Die'n....Host of the 2020 Bash at the Beach/The only Bash that got cancelled  )8
 

9/17/2020 9:23 AM  #16


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

Watch the original Gone In 60 Seconds made in 1974 I think. They wrecked around 89 cars during a 48 minute chase scene. I think they only had 2 cars to make the movie. Later dude

 

9/17/2020 4:22 PM  #17


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

Raymond_B wrote:

I'll probably catch hell about this, but in the first Transformers movie the cop car is one of the bad guys. There's a pretty good chase that goes on for a bit where the cop car chases the old Camaro (Bumblebee). I think the cop car was a Roush or Saleen supercharged setup as you can hear the whine. To me that was the most memorable scene in the movie, other than a few others that are not fit to discuss on a family friendly site

My brain blood went elsewhere when Megan Fox bent over the engine.  Then came surging back when she claimed it had a carb and clearly it had individual stack EFI.  I mean really Hollywood?  If you'd like me to vet the car dialog in your movies just ask.  When a character is supposed to be a gearhead and make stupid comments no gearhead would make the whole premise becomes unbelievable, and this was a movie about alien robots...
 

 

9/17/2020 4:24 PM  #18


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

6sally6 wrote:

Since I (many of us here to) was in the audience when Bullitt firsted showed, I can tell you it "checked a lot of the boxes" as far as good movies back then.
1. It had a little blood and gore to grab your interest (remember this was mid 60's)
2. Had a little touch of "skin" (I think?)
3. A hint of sex
4. A no nonsense cop with law & order his ONLY interest (like Joe Friday or RPM
5. Cool chase scene
6. Good guys win in the end.
Simple plot......$$$ maker.....showcased a young good looking star (I'll bet the movie has millions more views since most of the starts are dead than when they were alive and kicking!!!
6sal6

Also, wasn't there some political corruption?  Bullit was a cop, but kind of an antihero/stick it to the man kind of cop, very apropo for the time. 

 

9/17/2020 4:26 PM  #19


Re: Finally saw 'Bullitt'

Another underrated film with some nice driving was Drive with Ryan Gosling.  I respect a guy who turned down being in a boy and because he didn't need it to get chicks, and thought they were lame and cliched. 

 

Board footera


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