Frazz by Jef Mallett for August 20, 2018

They say if you listen carefully at Taylor and Filbert you can still hear hubcaps rattling on the pavement.

I saw it in 1969, and the only thing I remembered after I left was the car chase.

Well, I haven’t seen the movie, but I know the car! The Ford Mustang 390 GT Fastback! And I am not even a car-buff!

I remember watching it on the big screen in the theater. I also remember it was kind of touch and go for my stomach. I wonder how many theater owners regretted that the distributer didn’t supply barf-bag with the film.

Super movie. Not a lot of plot but a first class chase scene.

Never seen the movie, but I’ve seen clips of the car chase! I always thought the Blues Brothers had the best car chase scene—-until I saw the one in Bullitt!

Too bad the chase is TOTALLY out of the proper sequence for going through San Francisco, including going the wrong way on some one way streets.

Saw Bullitt in December ‘68 – first date with this particular girl. Afterwards, I opened the door on my ’68 Z-28 for her, went around, and got in the driver’s side – to be met with a snowball in the face. Been together ever since – married with kids and grands.

The fastest car in Bullitt was a VW. Proof? Consider, how many times did they pass the VW? The VW kept getting in front of them.

The French Connection also has a great car chase scene. Remember Cheech and Chong’s bit called “Pedro and Man at the Drive-In”? They get into the drive-in movie and then Pedro (Cheech) is tearing through the drive-in parking area (it’s all audio, but you hear the sound effects). And Man (Tommy Chong) says to him, in his best Tommy Chong voice, “You drive like Steve McQueen.”

the best part for me is the soundtrack, just the car no music

Best car chase ever.

Next time you see it, watch the face of the passenger in the bad guys’s car.

He wasn’t a stunt person, the driver was a professional driver and he wasn’t holding back when filming.

I’ve always wanted to have a Bullitt replica Mustang (Highland Green), I might just get the 2019 Bullitt edition Mustang, it’s hard to argue with 475 hp. And it ONLY comes with a stick, so you actually have to know how to drive.

Bullitt has a great car chase scene, and so does The French Connection. But if you like car chases, see Ronin. The only car chase scene better than the first one in Ronin is the second one.I saw the car chase scene in a promo for the movie, and had to see the whole movie. It’s good and also has the best Maguffin of all.

Another good one was the first Gone In 60 Seconds. A 40 minute chase wrecked 93 cars, with a total of 127 cars wrecked or damaged in the whole movie.

It was also one of the first major movies to show gunshot wounds as something other than a little hole with a blood dribble.

I remember a little more, but it’s not worth remembering.

…and who could forget McQueen’s car chase sequence in Silent Movie?

Don’t know if my wife ever saw Bullitt (only that I haven’t), but the SF chases in “What’s Up, Doc?” and “Foul Play” make her overlook her loathing of Barbra Streisand, Ryan O’Neil, Chevy Chase, and Goldie Hawn.

That was a great car chase, but I’m partial to the Las Vegas car chase in Jason Bourne_. I kept saying, “They can’t do that, can they?” The proof was on the screen. Good movie!

50 years old and a damn good movie. That time was when the Oscars actually went to movies people watched, not political statement movies that are actually painful to watch, can you say “moonlight”?

I like that whenever he was at a restaurant he had to call the precinct to let them know how to reach him. No cellphones!

Side note to the car chase in Bullitt is that McQueen did ACTUALLY drive the Mustang in the chase scene. BUT the better part of that is there was a camera man shooting in the car with him, and at one point he ran out of film and told McQueen that he needed to pull over and stop to let him get more film. McQueen relied that he would try but it could take a bit as he had burned out the brakes on the car.

Must see movies for chases

Ronan

Italian Job (original, not the remake)

Short Time (yes, Short Time)

Seven Ups

The car was built to Steve McQueens personal specifications. Under the details for the building of the car, it says that the cars (2 were built) had posi-traction. The means that both wheels turn together. That had to be wrong because when they show him backing up and taking after the charger, only one of the back wheels was burning rubber. They would both be doing that with posi-traction. Also in the chase which shows various angles for the mustang coming down this hill and turning left at the bottom of the hill, there is a green VW in the road that shows up in that sequence at least three times so it was filmed three times from different angles.

McQueen was an avid racing driver, (much to the chagrin of the insurers; despite preferring to do his own driving, he was not allowed to do the motorcycle jump in “The Great Escape”) often sharing the track with, among others, Paul Newman and Dick Smothers.

Chase scene from “The French Connection” wasn’t too shabby, either!

Don’t know about filmed chase scenes, but the funniest chase scene ever is at breakingcatnews.com. Click on Past Reports and scroll down to Our IX Lives. Read all of it, the chase scene starts in Episode 5.

There is not, and never has been, anything in the Chicago area like the bridge to nowhere in Blues Brothers.