This drag race inspired more “contest of speed” tickets than any other drag race ever for my generation. Had that train not interfered, I think the Charger would have pulled away.
Last week when I was talking about car films, I mentioned several of my favourites, but I intentionally left one out. Was it the best? No. Was it my favourite? No, but I should mention I did enjoy it. If you’re wondering what makes a movie like The Fast And The Furious so important to me, that I have devoted an entire column to it, consider this: I was a teenager when this movie came out, and it brought forth an automotive enthusiast movement never before seen.
The first film of eight (I believe) in the series was released in 2001, when I was seventeen years old. I actually went and saw it in the theatre, which I never usually do. How was it? Quite honestly, I enjoy it as much now as I did back then. Sure, the race scenes are a little long and unrealistic, and I have a hard time believing Dom held his title without rebuilding that Mazda rotary after every run with all that nitrous, but still, it’s a fun film with a great soundtrack and a good storyline. That’s all fine and wonderful, but why do I think that it’s such a success at shaping a generation? Simple. For the next roughly five years after it debuted, I witnessed cars quite obviously inspired by it.
A Chevy Cavalier went from an economy car to a race car with the right sticker and muffler combination. Is a Pontiac Sunfire a race car? Typically, no, but with a tape-on hood scoop and spray-painted dash, it can sure look like one. Huge stereo systems, wild lighting, lower-than-low body trim effects, and of course, the wings. A guy I knew had his huge, tasteless, double-decker aluminum wing stolen off of his Mustang because they were that hot at the time. It was also the first time period that I can think of where a four-door was an acceptable platform to modify. Even now, it’s hard for me to accept that some dude in his mom’s old crew cab Camry with a hacked-off muffler, yellow tint and some dub-caps on the wheels could be the hot ticket, but the fact of the matter is, for that short half-decade, that was indeed the case. Were these guys fast? Some of them, yes. There were some Nissan Z-cars and Toyota Supras that could really walk away from a light on a Saturday night, and the odd RX7 did okay as long as it had a few gallons of race gas thrown at it. The fastest sport compact I ever had a chance to ride in was an Eagle Talon with the boost cranked up like the volume knob on a cheap boom box with the good Slayer cassette. I felt like I needed a spacesuit during take-off down that residential street in the middle of the night. But I also felt a certain sense of security in knowing that no one could get the license plate number, as the car had a twenty-four-hour permit taped to the back window. Now, I know what you’re thinking, that films like American Graffiti and Dazed and Confused are more important to the automotive world. That may or may not be true, but the fact of the matter is those two films were staged in the past, while The Fast and the Furious shaped the future, even if just for a very short time.
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