I love movies and I love cars, and so, I love car movies. Great ones, especially, but all of them, really. Even such gems as Driven and Need For Speed. Was Need For Speed even that bad? I need to rewatch.
Anyway, whether good or great or actual dreck, I think every car movie is ripe for a remake or sequel. No matter how well made the original was, there’s a lot more that can be done with today’s camera technology and VFX. Or maybe it’ll just be fun to see a great movie updated with today’s latest stars and cars. Whatever the reason, I want to know what car movies (and what constitutes a “car movie” is up to you) you’d like to see “reimagined” (ugh) for modern screens, if not modern sensibilities.
The Bishop’s choice is The Driver, a movie I’m embarrassed to say I haven’t seen. I mean, come on, a 1978 Walter Hill film with Ryan O’Neal and Bruce Dern about a getaway wheelman? It’s a must-see! The Bish imagines a remake in the mode of “a low-key Heat or The Town,” but I’m excited just to see the O.G.
Says Bishop:
You wouldn’t imagine sixties heartthrob Ryan O’Neal as a low-key bank robbery getaway driver, but he works perfectly in this underrated film. Come on, anything with Bruce Dern has to be worth a look. Some might say that Baby Driver was a sort-of remake but it takes it too over-the-top.
Actually, it’s been 15 years since the film Drive, so a remake of The Driver might be a nice scratch for that itch. Maybe they’d use that guy from The Bear. You know, that dude that always looks sad and brooding with some kind of deep feelings.
Also, The Driver features a scene in a parking garage with more U.S. spec Peugeot 604s than you’ll ever see in one picture (and some bonus 504s):
BONUS, from The Bish: brand-new 504!
Here’s the 1978 trailer (below); I also really like the 4K restoration trailer:
As for Mercedes, would you be surprised she’s all about cimema’s most famous bus movie? I’m talking about Speed, of course.
Speed was glorious for figuring out how to take the least-thrilling form of public transportation, the bus, and turn it into an edge-of-your-seat action film. The plot is stupid on so many counts, and the film gives a large middle finger to physics when it wants to. But come on, tell me you wouldn’t want to see a Speed for 2026 with another beautiful General Motors bus struggle to never fall below 50 mph? I suppose the modern equivalent would have to be a New Flyer or something.
Look, this is just a flimsy excuse for me to say I want to see another bus run around an airport.
I’m sure you’ve all seen Speed, but here’s the trailer anyway:
Your turn: which car movies are crying out for a sequel or remake? What do you want to see in the new film? Who do you want to direct? What actors and cars should star? All that stuff!
Top graphic image: 20th Century Fox
It would be hard to capture the silliness of the original, but give me a Cannonball Run!
With the rise of self-driving vehicles, including 18 wheelers, there has never been a better time for a remake of Maximum Overdrive!
Just popped down to the comments to make sure someone gave this (correct) answer.
Used cars, the one with Kurt Russell in it and the one about an off ramp that has a waterskiing elephant and a rhinoceros and a stretch Zimmer all in the same film. Please will someone remember what it was called, please please.
Honky Tonk Freeway https://youtu.be/k4iNrHgLIAg?si=sRT5FyVW2tdf6tLc
Thank you and kisses,
Not precisely a car movie, but It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.
AKSHULLY, it’s Honky Tonk Freeway https://youtu.be/k4iNrHgLIAg?si=sRT5FyVW2tdf6tLc
Sorry, thought you werre replying to Nic!
No worries, but bonus points for AKSHULLY.
I remember a movie made in the mid 1950s of some guys tooling around in a white Jaguar XK 120. „The Fast and the Furious“ or something like this. They should definitely do a remake of that.
Ah, found it:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UTSU9FHtogw&ra=m
Since Disney loves live action remakes, how about live action Cars, but not the CGI crap they’ve been punching out,
100% practical effects using aminatronic real life versions of Lightning McQueen, Doc, etc.
I would also love to see something like TFATF redone in stop motion animation.
They could remake Gone in 60 Seconds and not fuck it up by resolving the dramatic tension of the car chase with a goddamn gun fight. Seriously, the way they get out of wrecking Eleanor in the car chase in the original is absolutely brilliant. The new one is crap and always has been.
Yes, I’m willing to die on this hill.
Can we go back to when car movies were just fun practical chaos – Eat My Dust or Grand Theft Auto (the 1970s movie, not the video games).
This is the place where I’m obligated to bring up Sorcerer.
There have been a few terrible remakes/other visions of “Wages of Fear”, the best of which was an episode of The Mandalorian, but it would be cool to see a remake of Sorcerer itself that tightens the story a bit, ups the pace, and goes all-in on practical effects for something that tops the rope bridge scene.
Have you ever read the history on that rope bridge?
They built the bridge over a river, then the river dried up.
They moved to a new location and built a bridge over that river and a drought reduced it to a trickle. They ended up using that bridge and water cannons if I recall correctly after having spent millions on two bridges.
Read? I’ve practically studied it more than anything I studied in college. Yeah. They had a drought so they had to create their own storm, which is amazing when you watch the movie and see what they created. They also did drop the truck into the river on a couple of takes and had to pull it out.
Why am I reminded of Swamp Castle? “But the third bridge had water running under it and that is what you’ll inherit.”
I’m torn on this, because on one hand, Sorcerer is still great.
On the other hand, as you point out, a tighter story and quicker pace might be nice, especially for a modern audience who will never watch the original anyway.
Unfortunately, if someone does remake it, we’ll end up watching The Rock yeet a couple sticks of nitro-glycerin into the river just as the bridge breaks beneath him, so the force of the CG explosion can push his CG truck up onto the bank. He looks over at Jason Statham in the passenger seat, raises one eyebrow, and says, “I told you this job would be a blast.”
Ah, screw it, I’ll just go pop in my blu-ray of the original.
Yeah, there’s a 2024 French remake of The Wages of Fear and it’s very, very terrible.
FYI a video game game out recently based on the film called Nitroglycerine! It’s a just a short, slightly silly thing, but it’s fun.
In my head, it was Bullitt, with a younger George Clooney playing the titular hero.
The car would be a late 80s/early 90s Mustang 5.0LX notchback in an appropriate dark green. He painted the car that colour because “he saw it in a movie once.” It would not be too fancy or “movie like” because it would have to be believeable he could afford it on a cop’s salary.
Running SCCA autocross and the occasional track day on weekends would explain both the driving capabilities and the car ownership.
There would be no need to change his wardrobe. None at all.
Yes, I’ve thought about this way too much.
Remake The Fast and the Furious with surfing.
Remake I want to see. Stroker Ace
I mean if you make a Speed remake its going to end up with an Electric Gillig burning to the ground.
Fast & Furious, but with EV’s. Without the gear changes you can really focus on the plot …
I would love a few remakes in which they take an old scool classic and then just abide the laws of physics.
Miss Mercedes! I beg your padon!
Calling a bus ‘the least-thrilling form of public transportation’ is just wrong.
Just when I was starting to think you were my favourite writer, you make this kind of broad sweeping phrase.
Busses as a public transportation. Along with their technical challenges such as bendy busses or double deckers, and their manic, underpaid, depressed and speed obsessed drivers makes every bus ride far, FAR more thrilling as a public transportation than, say a metro ride or one of those bike sharing deals.
You may not share my oppinion, but believe me. There are dozens like me.
DONZENS!
1986’s The Wraith. It’s kind of like The Crow but with a car instead of a crow.
I had pretty much forgotten about it until an episode of Zak’s Planet of Garbage reminded me, but I remember seeing it when I was a kid.
Well, glad to hear I’m not the only one that listened to that and then had to go back and watch the movie. It’s cheesy, but definitely entertaining and it’s satisfying to see all the douchebags get wrecked.
Pre facelift Sandra Bullock. And Keanu Reeves. And Dennis Hopper! Going to watch Speed again this fall. Such a great movie!
its spooky season Practical Magic time
Resto mods with a lot of bondo are not really me
The whole idea of American graffiti could be adjusted to any decade. Going back a decade. Make it based around an east coast boba shop with Korean and Japanese cars a decade ago. Keep it as sort of a mumble pic not some weird action movie.
Remake? I don’t know. Though I am envisioning the scene from Mad Max, but it’s an LLV instead with two mechanics saying “tell him about the blower man!” Mel asks when he can try it out and the background tv cuts in: “Congress is worried about ballots being delivered on time.”
“Let’s go for a ride!”
Isn’t there sequel for Speed which was about cruise ship? Or Should I not talk about it?
Yeah, unfortunately there was. Which, I guess, means Speed III would have to involve an airplane or ekranoplan
Speed, but with a Cybertruck. Hear me out. Can’t go below 55 mph AND have to defuse the bomb before it runs out of battery. Double whammy! Plus, think of all the scathing looks from everyone else as a Cybertruck goes barreling through intersections, etc.
Thunder Road. A great movie that just needed a larger budget. Robert Mitchum still gets to sing the theme song, though.
I would say “Drive-In,” which is not technically a car movie, just a movie where the cars make up most of the supporting cast and points of interest – except no one would watch it, because there’s hardly such a thing as drive-ins anymore.
I’ve watched so many ’50s & ’60s juvenile delinquent films and beach party films (and even 1974’s “The California Kid”) I can’t even remember most of them. They all had great cars in them, but were they “car movies”? Would re-making them do anything valuable? (Well, it would give Sydney Sweeney a chance to take Mamie Van Doren’s roles… but who can replace Norm Grabowski, or his cars?)
How ‘but Chitty Chitty Bang Bang? But only if Sydney Sweeney plays Truly Scrumptious.
It sounds like you’re saying you’d like to see Sydney Sweeney in anything or nothing at all?
I see Sydney’s Weenie!
I see Sydney’s Weenie!
I see Sydney’s Weenie!
Maximum overdrive
Christine, although it could be a brief pop up in the 80s as the last big Chryslers, then again now, as either a clapped out charger, or maybe as an electric one.
The Car
LeMans
I’d love to see The Car get re-done, but I argue Christine is a perfectly shot movie, and any remake could never do it justice.
Yeah, itd be real hard to do, it probably if done right, which it wont, be a sequel.
There actually was a remake of Maximum Overdrive – There was a TV movie on USA Network called “Trucks” based on the short story of the same name that gave us Maximum Overdrive. It was not that good. A touch more faithful to the story until it goes completely off the rails. Besides, Maximum Overdrive is the best 2 hour AC/DC music video ever.
Trucks was fun, especially with how not everything was out to kill people, or was it?
I feel like today with EVERYTHING being connected, it could go waay darker.
The soundtrack was probably the money maker, and cocaine
They should do Christine set in the present day, with a haunted Plymouth Breeze
Lol, that would be epic.
Just weezing along, stalking its new lover.
If Christine was redone a little closer to the book, I think that would be cool. Carpenter had enough variance from the book if a new director went with more the possession angle, it could be a great retelling.
Yeah, the book had more feel to it for sure, especially christine being a frumpy yellow savoy, but not aure who’d be up to the task, unless ultra gritty like blomkamp
Christine is a Fury in the novel, too, since King really wanted to use that model name. When he started writing, he didn’t know 1958 Furies were only 2-doors, he found out later, but too late to go back and remove all references to rear doors
I coulda swore it was a savoy, but.. i handt read the book in probably 20 years. But hey, not the first time a writer got a detail wrong.