Why cant Hollywood make a good car movie?

[the68project]

Hello, I'm kind of green to the posting thing, but I've been reading and learning a while and still trying to piece together my old Camaro.

For some reason, I just wanted to see who all is with me in wanting a decent accurate car movie with some good real exhaust notes, accurate handling, and realistic performance. My wife just laughs at me when I get grouchy about inaccurate things people say and do in movies. What got me started ranting about it was...

We were watching the Transformers movie the other night, and when the yellow Camaro quits on the kid, the girl jumps out, pops the hood and says something intelligent like "wow, a high rise double pump carb" while the engine bay showed a fuel injection set up.

Anyone care to help me think up some more? Here's a few that stand out in my mind. (yes, i realize these are fiction but c'mon)

Fast and the Furious - Nitrous Oxide being the end all be all of blurred vision instantaneos speed.
Gone in 60 Seconds -not too bad until.. launching Eleanor the Mustang to get away from 500 cops
Dukes of Hazzard - Jumping just about everything and landing it
Knight Rider - Watched 30 seconds of a scene on YouTube and realized it was completely terrible.
Almost any movie - people can't take off from a stop without chirping a tire.

[Jim Nilsen]

People mostly have no sense of reality much less any sense.
If it is not unreal it doesn't have anything for our blurred imagination to connect to. You ever heard someone say " that's totally unreal man!" and it was not in the way it is meant. Unreal is what is cool to people these days.

You want reality. Look at reality shows. Most suck because most reality isn't entertainment.

Car shows work for us when they are real, when they are drama we all get sick of it right away. A few shows come to mind when I say that to you?

Chop Cut Rebuild,My Classic Car, Dream Car Garage, Hotrod TV, Trucks, etc. are all reality that shows you what you dream about. But we are car guy's with an imagination.

Most people these days are so bored with their imaginations and expect to be entertained by someone else. They rely on it to a point that they get depressed when someone isn't manipulating their every thought. If you tell them they are mindless and manipulated they get angry. It's a wonder they even have that emotion left to their imagination. How would they know what to be angry about in reality. They do nothing for themselves most of the time that they are not told what to do by a commercial ,a doctor, a boss, the government and their kids. It really makes me wonder when kids run the house and not the parents?

So you are not alone .I am right there with you. We are both probably in the garage too much for others to understand with their limited imaginations.

You can't fix stupid and that is most of America these days.

I wish I could cheer you up , but maybe I did by letting you know that you are not alone !

[the68project]

Thanks for the backup!

Its mostly humorous to me how skewed they can make things and how many misconceptions they can portray. I think I was just venting because especially in a movie/show thats not supposed to be unrealistic, I get "THE LOOK" from my wife when I say "that would never happen like that". I think a lot of people's misconceptions about a lot of things are based on hollywood's take.

I forget about the reality shows since we don't have cable or satellite. I do wish I had the Speed channel. I'm really hoping to get to see some of this Ultimate Street Car Challenge. That sounds like it would make some fine entertainment!

[jst8a5.0]

Fast and furious Tokyo Drift was better than the rest as far as reality goes. Minimal CG. But honestly, in the first F+F where the supra vs Charger race happened, it would have been nice if they modeled the hero car off a real car or built one that could have really pulled the wheels on the street. We don't need a pole vaulting charger. I am with you guys on this. Enough explosions and musclecar destruction with an oh well attitude afterward. Lets see some real footage but with better angles than your typical streetfire vid.

Jim Nilsen is right about people's imagination. It just sucks because real car guys have that imagination, just look at the project updates. We are the ones that want these movies, it's just a shame they are not catered to us. Let's look at the first F+F:
1 I went hunting and won my first street race bet that night to a modded WRX pushing 20 lbs.
2 How many ricers came out of the wood work after that movie in addition to what was out there. I mean REAL rice. There are websites dedicated to pointing it out.
3 The word ALL true car guys HATE "noss" in reference to N.O.S.

I actually kicked a customers friend out of my shop for using that word. Hollywood is not your father!

[Young Gun]

they are mutually exclusive, plain and simple haha

[novanutcase]

Jim hit the nail on the head!

I would like to add one thing. Hollywood is in the business of entertaining people. That means exaggerating something normal to peak their interest. Us gearheads get all wet seeing a twin screw blower because we know what it can do and the feeling you get inside the car. Most people have no idea and to try and get that feeling through film alone would be next to impossible so the next best thing is to exaggerate it to that point so that anyone can feel that same feeling even though the actual experience isn't the same.

John

[65 347]

Guys your not alone, some of the other unreal things are tires squeeling when they are on dirt or gravel or hearing a deep v-8 growl when it's 4cyl Cavalier.

[V8TV]

I have not seen it yet, but I did meet the man behind it, and he's a total gear head. Let's hope "Clutch" is a film we all dig.

http://clutchthemovie.com/

[72 RS/SS]

Another pet peive I have is when a car is shown racing through the streets banging gears but in other scenes it's clearly an automatic. I hate to see a car do a jump, knock off the bumper or fold the fenders and in the next scene no damage...does anyone not notice this? Do they think we are all idiots and won't be able to tell?
I really prefer the older chase scenes in movies like Bullet, French Connection, Blues Brothers and the original version of Gone In 60 seconds. It seems todays movie makers can't do anything anymore without CGI. Some of it's cool but most is over the top and completely ruins it for me. Don't get me started...

[jst8a5.0]

oh yeah, there is another movie supposed to come out too. It's called cruise night or something to that effect. There was a booth at SEMA that had the cruise night stickers and they looked out of place so I asked about the stickers. That's when he told me it was a movie they were doing. So keep our hopes up. There may be at least 2 good movies coming out. Oh yeah and F+F 4 will be out in summer '09.