Bullitt, Steve McQueen's Mustang
Bullitt isn't a driving film, at all, but the mere mention of it evokes one single phrase: car chase. Quite frankly, Bullitt's screenplay could have been about a retirement home field trip to a box factory and it would still have become legendary (assuming the scriptwriters could somehow work the car chase into that particular subject matter). Nonetheless, let's summarise. Lieutenant Frank Bullitt is assigned to guard a key witness in a court case against the mafia, so when the witness is shot, Bullitt needs to find out who did it and who ordered it. Basically, a chase ensues involving the two hit-men, in a black Dodge Charger, and Bullitt in the now iconic green 1968 V8 Ford Mustang fastback.
Regularly voted the greatest car chase of all time in 'greatest car chases of all time' type polls, the near ten minute sequence has become the stuff of legend. It's raw, visceral, naturalistic and exhilarating - and riddled with mistakes. Despite the film winning an Oscar for best editing in 1969, the chase scene features some now infamous gaffes, like the cars passing the same green VW Beetle numerous times, the Charger losing more than four hubcaps, and the same Charger driving unscathed straight through the petrol station it has just struck and exploded.
The Mustang was heavily modified for the chase scene so it could cope with the strains of high speed jumps, including engine upgrades, extra chassis welding, stiffer suspension and a thicker anti-roll bar. The Charger, however, remained mostly stock. It's widely thought that McQueen did all the driving for the scene, and although that theory perpetuates McQueen's now mythical coolness quite nicely, it's not actually true. McQueen did indeed take the wheel for a significant amount of the driving up and down the undulations of the San Francisco streets, but it was actually stunt driver Carey Loftin who did the dangerous stuff.
The Mustang used in the chase scene was one of two loaned to Warner brothers by Ford for the film, though one of them did the majority of the stunt work and was later crushed for liability reasons. The remaining car is now owned by a businessman who is keeping its whereabouts a closely guarded secret and refuses to even provide any pictures of it. He even rejected an offer to buy it from Steve McQueen himself in 1977.
Tuesday November 18
