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
Ronin.
Damnation Alley.
Christine.
Repo Man.
Cobra (should be easy to improve).
Sequel? Another Mad Max wouldn’t hurt my feelings.
Remakes? Not interested.
Remake Chitty Chitty Bang Bang closer to what Ian Fleming intended. A supernatural car, possibly haunted by the ghost of Count Zabrowski? Who not only built a series of land speed record in Brooklands race cars named Chitty Chitty Bang Bang using Zeppelin engines, but drove one of them across the Sahara desert with his wife? Who also competed in the Indianapolis 500 driving a Bugatti and was a Grand Prix racer until he was killed driving for Mercedes-Benz? Also, I believe five of his cousins were United States presidents. In the horrible movie as per Disney custom, the mother is dead, and some sort of candy heiress is substituted possibly because the film script was written by Roald Dahl. In the book, the very much alive Mother accompanies the family to a cave in France to deal with some international arms smugglers.
Is any of that stuff in the god-awful Disney movie? Nope.
Fast & the Furious obviously (/s)
The Italian Job
“dirty Mary, crazy Larry” . Gosling as Larry (Fonda), Russell Crowe as Vic Morrow the cop, Emma Stone as Mary (Susan George), Sam Rockwell as Doc. sort of a Nice Guys reunion. I will accept offers to direct, lol.
Biker Boys
The Wraith. It came out in 86 so I grew up watching on it on TV. I just learned It’s used a Dodge M4S as it’s show car (look it up), and it stars Charlie Sheen as *SPOILER ALERT*
a ghost who came back to avenge his death, and fall in love?
It’s worth a watch just for the cool car sounds.
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang
Cannonball Run, but I can’t imagine a modern version being anything but awful.
Since nobody has mentioned it, my vote is for Gung Ho. Starring Michael Keaton about a Japanese company taking over an American plant building some weird Fiats. That seemed odd back in the 80s, but much closer to reality these days.
None. not a single one. I am so tired of remakes and sequels to movies 30 years old. I will accept original film ideas only, even if silly or over the top. As long as the movie is about the characters, the cars are cool, and the chases are fun. Stories have gotten weak and distracted in Hollywood in the last 10 years.
Another Ronin, but not a remake. A completely original film with car chases just as good as Ronin.
Speed got a sequel; it was terrible. Let’s just leave that alone.
Vanishing Point, because a ridiculously pointless movie absolutely needs a ridiculously pointless-er sequel. There’s only like six people that were in the original still left alive and they’ve had over 50 years to live down the original. Time to make another silly car-based movie. No, not another FF-whatever. Something sillier.
Vanishing point has a surprisingly high reputation among filmmakers and artists.
Also it has a really great dolly zoom shot.
It is a fantastic movie.
Fun car movie related trivia;
Gilda Texter was the girl on the motorcycle, and was the costumer for Herbie: Fully Loaded (2005).
Notably, in Vanishing Point she had no costume.
As I recall she was wearing a Yamaha?
My bad, it’s clearly a Honda. I wasn’t focusing properly.
I could have sworn it was a BSA.
Look closer. It’s worth inspecting carefully.
This and other defenses of VP notwithstanding, it is nevertheless pointless. The filmography is above average especially considering the hasty way the movie was shot. The story, thin as it is, exists to provide endless footage of Chrysler Corporation products streaking across the desert.
By some measures – and some motives – Vanishing Point is a long-format commercial.
Sigh.
You probably didn’t know it, but it’s basically a religious movie.
In Buddhist meditation, the “vanishing point” refers to the exact moment a thought, sensory experience, or the ego itself dissolves into emptiness. Rather than focusing on how things arise, this practice trains the mind to attend to how things cease and disappear, offering a direct gateway to experiencing impermanence (anicca) and voidness (sunyata)
I’m only vaguely familiar with Buddhist tradition, but Vanishing Point and Groundhog Day are both highly regarded on that basis. It’s a hero’s journey story arc, much like the Star Wars films.
The title alone should be a clue.
Anyway, when Kowalski drives the car through the bulldozers, that’s the vanishing point as described in Buddhism. I think the store is pretty obvious.
Of course Fox did do a remake and completely lost the Buddhism and turned him into some sort of MAGA twit.
…that…
…is one way to look at it, I suppose. And indeed actors and the director comment in that direction.
You’re right. I sure as heck didn’t know it. It’s far from obvious, shoot, it’s not even a notion that crossed my mind. it’s been many years since I saw it – and I have no intention of wasting that time again – but I don’t remember any such theme suggesting itself.
Coming from the point of view of a nonreligious viewer, it’s much too subtle to take in in a car chase movie.
Duel, but only after an official written explanation is given to the question that has been haunting me for decades:
How is it that in movies a truck, pickup truck, van, bus, or altogether – the entirety of the World’s vehicle production that has “Naturally and by design limited to 60mph tops” as sole common point, will always chase, catch up to, bump into, then run off the road cars that have a natural cruising speed in the 90s or low 100s, and can top to way over 150?
It’s always screaming kids chased by a postal truck while in a W140 S Class.
I’ll take my answer in writing, signed and stamped, thanks 🙂