Movies
WAMG Presents: The TOP TEN Best Movie Car Chases of the 1970’s
There’s nothing like a good car chase in a movie. Maybe it’s the daring-do of the stunt drivers that makes you feel you’re in danger even though you’re comfortably in your seat, or the high stakes of the moment in which the characters we’re rooting for will either get out of the situation or have a gruesome finale, but an impressive car-chase scene can make even a mediocre movie a beloved classic. What makes a car chase legendary, you ask? They’re the ones that keep you at the edge of your seat and actually fit in with the rest of the plot. While the “Fast and Furious” movies have collectively taken the car chase to the next level, they don’t count. They’re far too CGI-enhanced. The 1970’s may have marked a new age in American cinema, but it was also a decade of movies filled with practical car chases that are still the best. Here are the 10 greatest car chase movies of that glorious decade.
10. RACE WITH THE DEVIL (1975)
RACE WITH THE DEVIL was an unforgettable hybrid of horror and car chases. Warren Oates and Peter Fonda (along with wives Loretta Swit and Lara Parker) hit the road in a mammoth state-of-the-art (for 1975) motor home with a horde of devil worshipers in hot pursuit. The satanic road rage on display in the stunt-filled highway climax is insane.
9. WHITE LIGHTNING (1973)
What list about 70s car culture would be complete without a couple of Burt Reynolds movies? The 1973 moonshine opus WHITE LIGHTNING was full of booze, broads, car chases, corruption and revenge — all the things that make life worthwhile. Burt Reynolds at his peak of awesomeness (and sans mustache) mostly drove a 1971 Ford Galaxie Custom 500 to take on on despicable redneck Sheriff Ned Beatty.
8. DIRTY MARY CRAZY LARRY (1974)
Basically a movie-long car chase, this 1974 drive-in standard takes Susan George, Peter Fonda, and Adam Roarke through miles of rural countryside and small town highways with local police, led by Sheriff Vic Morrow, in pursuit after they’ve robbed a grocery store. They start off in a 1966 Chevrolet Impala, which they eventually ditch for a 1969 Dodge Charger 440 to stay ahead of Morrow in his Bell JetRanger helicopter.
7.VANISHING POINT (1971)
The 1971 road movie VANISHING POINT directed by Richard C. Sarafian is notable for its scenic film locales across the American Southwest and its social commentary on the post-Woodstock mood in the United States. Barry Newman and his 1970 Dodge Challenger R/T take a journey across the country defying everything the authorities can throw at him in this cult classic.
6. THE DRIVER (1979)
Walter Hill’s THE DRIVER gives us a number of lengthy car chases, including a thrilling and lengthy one near the beginning through the streets of Downtown LA. The Driver (Ryan O’Neal) steals a blue 1974 Ford Galaxie 500, which he promptly uses to escape the police with a crew of casino robbers on board. THE DRIVER is somewhat forgotten today, but well worth seeking out.
5. GONE IN SIXTY SECONDS (1974)
Amateurish, badly-acted and shot on the cheap, the original GONE IN SIXTY SECONDS (1974) is still perhaps the ultimate drive-in car chase movie. If that sounds like a backhanded compliment, then you don’t know the sheer visceral thrill of this great tire squealing, chassis-slamming, slice of outlaw auto cinema. The cult item features a 40-minute car chase that features every 60s and 70s muscle car you can imagine. Writer/Director H.D. Halicki was killed in an on-set accident while filming the sequel.
4. SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT (1977)
Redneck bad boys were all the rage in 1977. Cars were still made in Michigan and CB radios were the hot technology with phrases like “10-4 good buddy” familiar expressions and SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT captured that side of American culture as well as any film. It was the directorial debut for former stuntman Hal Needham and was the first of nine stunt-filled collaborations with his pal Burt Reynolds.
3. MAD MAX (1979)
This low-budget, high-octane Australian thriller spawned three sequels, two of which (ROAD WARRIOR in 1982 and MAD MAX FURY ROAD in 2015) are action masterpieces. The Mad Max films show that stunts themselves would be nothing without a filmmaker behind the camera and George Miller, a doctor and film buff making MAD MAX, his first feature in 1979, showed he knew what cinema was all about. Max’s black Pursuit Special driven by Mel Gibson was a 1973 Ford Falcon.
2. THE FRENCH CONNECTION (1971)
Gene Hackman’s Popeye Doyle commandeers a civilian’s 1971 Pontiac LeMans in THE FRENCH CONNECTION which begins one of the greatest, most heart-pounding car chase sequences in movie history. Doyle is frantically chasing an elevated train, on which a hitman is trying to escape. The scene was filmed in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn and is a masterpiece of editing for which Gerald Greenberg took home a well-deserved Oscar.
1. THE SEVEN-UPS (1973)
This 1973 follow-up to THE FRENCH CONNECTION (some of the same cast play different characters – plus Richard Lynch and Joe Spinell!) was the sole directing credit of FRENCH CONNECTION producer Philip D’Antoni. The movie is highlighted by one absolutely incredible car chase, occurring just past the halfway point which cranks up the films’ energy level to a high degree. This is old school stunt driving and editing at its finest. The driver in the 1973 Pontiac Grand Ville sedan pursued by Roy Scheider in his 1973 Pontiac Ventura Sprint coupe is Bill Hickman, who was also the wheelman in the chase scene in BULLITT!
There were of course great car chase movies before and after the 70’s. Harold Lloyd’s SPEEDY features an eye-popping chase through the streets of New York that was filmed way back in 1927 while Robert Mitchum delivered the high-speed goods in THUNDER ROAD back in 1958. Some think the wrong-way car chase on a Los Angeles freeway in William Friedkin’s TO LIVE AND DIE IN L.A. (1985) outdid the chase sequence in his THE FRENCH CONNECTION. John Frankenheimer’s RONIN in 1998 was one of the last great car chase films before CGI took over, and of course THE ROAD WARRIOR and MAD MAX FURY ROAD are in a class by themselves, but the ‘70s is definitely when the car chase movie was at its peak.
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