clunky midsize car | James Bond | Roger Moore | Eddie Murphy

Running On Empty

by American Way Staff
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Eddie Murphy and Owen Wilson flee pursuers while their car is stuck on a truck, only returning to street level at the end. "The entire chase, they were just sitting in their car," says Hopkins. We fell asleep before we noticed.

Maximum Overdrive (1986)

After a possessed 18-wheeler fails to run down a clunky midsize car (as if), the truck swerves off a hillside and blows up! "[It's like] every truck is just packed with napalm or something, so as soon as it does anything, it automatically explodes," quips Hopkins.

A View to a Kill (1985)

Even James Bond has his off days. When Roger Moore races a taxicab through Paris, "all of a sudden, the back half gets cut off, and he's driving half a cab. That makes no sense." But it looked cool (in 1985).

XXX: State of the Union (2005)

At the beginning, audiences are teased with Mustangs, Bentleys, Porsches, Ferraris, and the prototype for a Cobra. The Cobra gets minimal use in a low-speed pursuit of a train by star Ice Cube. Blah.



MISFIRES Even the greatest cinematic chase ever has its flaws. In Bullitt, aside from a green VW that keeps popping up in shot after shot, the black Charger that Steve McQueen's Mustang is chasing loses as many as eight hubcaps during the chase. At the climax, the Charger crashes into a gas station and blows it up. "But the driver was going so fast, he couldn't control the car and missed the building altogether," reveals Hopkins. "If you watch in slow motion, you can see him drive behind the building and come out the other side, and then the building blows up." Still, we didn't notice. This one rules because it has no CGI or cheap effects and was probably pretty dangerous to pull off.

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