expensive cars they wreck in Hollywood movies, are they real or empty shells without engines? and glass?

Question

They seem to wreck BMW's,Mercedes, Ferraries, busses, trucks, etc Are they for real? Also what are hollywood glass made of? Try to crash through real glass and you'll be cut up like salami.

Answer 1

All of the cars are "real" in the sense that they move, though there may be a few that's shell only.

I'd suggest you rent the DVD for Bourne Supremacy. In the Extras they show you stunt vehicles that can be offset piloted (the driver is in a driving cockpit NOT in the car), but the car still moves like a real car, albeit it's just a shell on a platform. That's how they get the interior shots of the drivers.

The external shots are done with multiple cars and multiple cameras. They would not have the interior of the "hero car" (except it's generally the same color) or perhaps the same engine. For example, in Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift, the "hero" Mustang has 5 or 6 different twins, and only ONE of them actually have the RETT22 turbo engine from the Nissan Skyline, like the movie claims. As for the actual cars, some are setup do to dramatic drifts, some are setup for straights, and so on. Different moves calls for different cars.

If a car is crashed, and the damage is not too severe, the car department will spend the night banging them back together so it looks good enough for another shot the next day. In Bourne Supremacy bonus materials, I believe they said they had at least half-dozen of each vehicle and they wreck two or three every day, and the mechanical department fix them up every night. By the end of the film less than half have survived.

Remember, a movie has budget of millions. (Tokyo Drift had a budget of $25 mil, I think, and that's cheap) Compare to that, $10000 to $30000 for a car is not that expensive. The car department also bought used stuff and repainted them.

Hollywood glass, as others said, are made of sugar, so it simply shatters into tiny bits upon impact.

EDIT: Andy, Transporter 2 used a VW, not a Beemer.

Answer 2

Yes and No
Most of the times when you see supercars being wrecked, they are nothing more then kit cars.
The ferrari 250gt used in ferris buellers day off was a kit car built on an mgb chassis.
The miami vice ferrari daytona was a ferrari body on a corvette chassis.
BUT, there are some movies that use the real car.
The Transporter movies both used 7-series custom made by bmw for the movie.
The latest james bond movie has 3 aston martin dbs wreck, and they were real. Aston martin has been providing the bond movie cars free of charge for decades.
So you get a variety, if there are movies that are pretty much based around an auto brand, they use the real car when they wreck them, because they are free. Anytime you see a classic car get destroyed, theres no doubt that it is a kit car.

Answer 3

Winshields and bottles Movie glass is a sugar mixture--much like a candy apple coating--the cars are stripped for safety--roll overs are done with an air cannon under the car---literally blows the car over--first used in Mc Q in the 70s starring John Wayne---achieved a record 8 rolls out of a full size Chevy. The movie stunts are extremely well choreographed--timing is just perfect.---computers are used to set the facts and figures for speed and distance for a particular stunt. Normal cars can only withstand one wheels off the ground jump---multiple cars are used for extended chases. The first chase was Bullitt--starring Steve McQueen--1968. The streets didn't even intersect as they filmed bit by bit. That;s why the Dodge looses 18 hub caps after the entire sequence is shown--count them. The 68 Mustang was actually a matched group of 4--only one survived and it is in New Jersey--privately owned from an auction. The General Lee Dodge from the Dukes of Hazzard show was one of 17 actually used...none survived but plenty of imitators are out there. Another great chase scene is in the movie THE SEVEN UPS--Roy Schieder is a cop who drives a cool Pontiac when they made a model that had the same body as a Nova. It sounds really hot running through New York City, chasing the bad guys--what a wreck at the end. The car was actually wrecked with a stunt driver who had to duck to save his head--all planned ahead of time. Who can forget the Blues Brothers cop car into the side of a moving tractor trailer--done in one take with the perfect timing of hitting the launch ramp at 55 and the truck being exactly where it needed to be with the weakened trailer side for the car to hit.---the car almost fell out of the trailer---but it did stay and the stunt looks tremendous. The hundreds of cars used in the Blues Brothers movie were actual old police vehicles from chicago---most were stripped of interior parts then padded for the actual drivers to be involved with the collisions that seem so devastating. You can tell that some of the cars have roll cages inside. The Blues Brothers car was one of 7---one was fitted with a support system under the car to catch the end of the freeway construction----cables kept it from going off the end. the flip over car was a shell---weighed about 200 pounds. The Speed movie bus jump was a real fishbowl model bus---the jump was done in a sequence but computer enhanced to lengthen it. Don't forget all the vehicle interior shots are done with a portion of the passenger area mounted on a steel tube framed trailer, with cameras and microphones and lighting---all mounted on a truck and driven around as if the car was really moving--it is called an insert car. You can buy relica fenders and build any kind of car you want---even a million dollar Ferrari---put it in a VW chassis. My favorite is Raquel Welch in Mother jugs and Speed--she is a frustrated ambulance company employee who steals a Cadillac Ambulance.... the stunt driver pushes that 68 Caddy to the limit---watch as the lean pulls the front corner off the pavement--that is hard driving at its best. Siren screaming --the caddy runs through some streets at impressive speeds. It is filmed as it was driven-NO real special effects. Bill Cosby is also in the Movie from the 70s. Also watch Freebie and the Bean --- another great one--2 cops--James Caan and Alan Arkin--wreck Fords in the screwiest cop movie ever made. hope you can find these movies--they are great.

Answer 4

They are the real thing, but they are not complete, that is why the unwrecked ones cannot be sold as street legal after the movies are done. They are basically functional shells, much less expensive than the ones at the dealership. Hollywood glass, is indeed, fine imitation.

Answer 5

Depends on a whole bunch of things, but the first three are money, money and money. When we did the earthquake miniseries "10.5" a few years ago, all the cars in the sand which fell into holes or flipped or otherwise had a bad day were running vehicles - a few in great shape but most not - which were acquired from the impound lot of a local towing firm after having been abandoned by their registered owners.

When we do army trucks, buses, Hummers etc. again it depends on money, but what typically happens is you'll see a vehicle driving through shot or part of some sequence, then later on you'll see that vehicle meet a bad end. But the vehicle you see destroyed is often an "insert vehicle" which has the same paint job and general configuration etc., but usually has all the high-value kit stripped off first. I have one troop truck which has been 'blown up' on three different productions and until the last one it just needed the doors etc. bolted back on and a new paint job (the last blow up did in the frame though, so it's done.) Hummers the same way. One of the ones 'destroyed' on X-Men 3 lived on to fly another day in "Fantastic Four 2: Rise of the Silver Surfer", but now it's pretty much...uhh...'retired'. Yeah.

Buses depends on money again, with Feature Films and Commercials the biggest spenders, requiring multiples of the same or close to the same to do the various sequences. Again you usually have a 'star' vehicle or two and some uglier ones used for stunts and insert vehicles, but that's not always the way it goes. In "Speed" they used a large number of GM Fishbowl buses acquired from a couple of different sources, and though they're all basically the same type of bus - in a few sequences the differences show if you know what you're looking at. Either way they wrote off a bunch in true Dukes of Hazzard fashion.

Sometimes they'll rent/buy a bus specifically for thrashing, and that bus will be running/driving otherwise useful. "Smallville" took a perfectly running school bus and wrote it off by smashing it squarely into a wall awhile back, but school buses can be had relatively cheaply (5-8K) and the supply seems endless, so nobody shed much in the way of a tear when it happened. Same when the old series "Harsh Realm" needed a burnt out bus for a Sarajevo street-scene. The local bus company at that time had a number of rusted out, beat up and otherwise hammered on trolleybuses which were scrap metal value only, and sold one to the production to torch. It was very effective - used up an otherwise worthless asset - and as a result lives forever in reruns.

The biggest local outrage in terms of vehicle waste was an old production called "Needful Things", which rounded up something like a dozen comparatively rare older Mercedes vehicles and trashed them one-by-one as the director didn't like the way No.1 landed, and ordered the stunt repeated again and again as they went through Mercedes No. 6 and No.7 and No.8 etc. Vehicle aficianados watching from the sidelines just cried.

Sometimes the blow-up vehicle *has* to move under its own power through shot and into its explosive end-marks and it's usually here you'll find complete, decent vehicles getting thrashed. Typically that'll be a convoy scene or car chase or what-have-you, but also things like occupants jumping out before it hits a wall and other crap. Also if a vehicle flips or has its front-end blown off, nobody wants to see an echoing cavern where the engine and transmission should've been, so in those cases it is also generally a complete vehicle.

When you rig a vehicle for blowing up you generally have what they call 'mortars' placed inside the vehicle mounted to the frame which blow the hood and doors off or otherwise make a scripted mess of things. Any loose bits that can fly off or out are usually stripped off first, and sometimes they rig an air-ram underneath to make the vehicle lift off the ground. As has been mentioned the glass is usually sugar glass or taken out entirely if it doesn't need to be seen (or can't be seen), because anything on a blow-up truck becomes a missile when the FX go off!

Answer 6

Hollywood glass is made from sugar and it still hurts. it's not nearly as hard as sand glass but it does still hurt. as far as the cars, when your making a multi-million/Billion dollar movie whats the cost of a few new cars here and there.

Answer 7

when they were still filming the old Dukes of Hazzard pictures there were actually 25 identical General Lee cars. some of these had their front ends replaced multiple times from being mashed in after those big flying jumps they always did. that freeway chase scene in Matrix 3? they actually built that freeway just for the movie...at the old navy base in Oakland CA. so yeah, it costs big money to make these movies

Answer 8

Hey they spend how many millions to make a movie. You think they worry about the cost of a car.It's special glass but I forgot what kind they use.

Answer 9

i own a shop and a lot of them are real cars ,they use factory rejects on some things and a lot of it is free advertisement for the car company also ,but the actual majority of them are real cars not shells,good luck hope this helps.

Answer 10

They use 'sugar' glass, but for the most part--yes, they do use the REAL THING when it comes to cars.