Lamborghini Miura
The Miura was coup for the production
team, it was the supercar of the time,
and many still believe that it is still
the best looking supercar ever made. The
production team couldn't really justify
the expense to buy a new Miura. Lamborghini
helped out by selling the crew a full
shell, which was promptly painted bright
Orange and placed on an accident damaged
Miura chassis that the production had
also been lucky to get their hands on.
It was a truly stunning car that had only
been launched a few years earlier in 1966
at the Geneva Motor Show. Production ran
at Lamborghini for little over six years,
in which they had made just 762. The ironic
thing is that the Mini was born out of
the fuel crisis in the 50's and the Miura's
demise was due to a fuel crisis in the
70's.
Miura on Alpine
roads |
Where is it
now? |
Showroom Example |
Beckerman's
Miura was a classy sight to the first
viewers of The Italian Job, but unfortunately
it didn't get that much screen time. Destroyed
in a tunnel by the mob's Caterpillar,
it was unceremoniously pushed down the
mountainside. You can just make out that
the Miura's chassis has no engine in it
as it plummets down the mountain. Special
effects crew member, Ken Morris, remembered
that they went to retrieve the Miura the
next day, but it had disappeared. They
looked everywhere for it, but they never
found it. He concluded that someone must
have seen them throw it down the mountain
and launched a midnight expedition to
retrieve it. I wonder if it is still around
today?
In
the film the registration number of the
Lamborghini Miura is not clearly visible,
but it almost certainly had an Italian
'Targa Prova' plate (black & white)
.If you look at it carefully you can see
the red word PROVA and below the white
letters and numers. (may be BO.... because
Lamborghini Factory is based in S. Agata
, close to Bologna).
I have been informed that the registration number was BO 296.
Jaguar
E-Types
Croker's plan involved three fast cars
on standby. Two of these cars were Series
1 Jaguar E-Types, in effect the British
rival to the Italian Miura. One was a
black fixed head Coupe, the other was
a red roadster. Unfortunately, these Jags
suffered the same fate as the Miura, being
crushed my the mob and pushed down the
mountainside. The production crew managed
to get the E-Types for £900 each,
which was a bit of a bargain at the time,
even though they were 7-8 years old by
then.
Makes you
wanna cry |
Mob's Caterpillar
gets to work |
Restored &
with the Top Gear film crew |
Little
is known about the black fixed
head coupe, the registration was 619 DXX,
but the red 3.8L Roadster (848 CRY) is
alive and kicking today. The early Roadster
was originally the demonstrator for the
Leicester distributors, Sturgess's - it
was the 12th E-Type to be built. It was
the first E-Type to be involved in motorsport
and was raced with success during 1961
by Robin Sturgess with the registration
2 BBC. In 1962 Sturgess re-registered
the car 848 CRY and it was sold. Then
it ended up in the hands of model Richard Essame, who landed a part in The Italian Job, as 'Tony', one of the Cooper drivers. Richard drove the car to location in Italy and where the production team thought it would be ideal in the movie and purchased the car from him.
It's unclear where the
Jag was since the filming finished, but
it was totally restored in the early nineties
and has been featured in a variety of
magazine articles and on BBC's Top Gear
programme and is owned by internationally
renowned Jaguar author, motoring historian
and founder of The
E-Type Club, Philip Porter.
Philip Porter's 848 CRY today
Aston
Martin DB4
Charlie's 1961 (or '62) DB4 convertible
was a stunning car (Registration 163 ELT).
Caine couldn't actually drive whilst The
Italian Job was been filmed, so clever
editing had to be done when he collected
it after his stay in Wormwood Scrubs!
It's often said that the Aston blew up
early in the filming, so it wasn't actually
the DB4 that you see go over the mountainside.
This is half-true, In actual fact the
DB4 was pushed over the side of the mountain,
but the crew weren't happy with the scene
as they wanted it to burst into flames.
But the special effects crew member (Pat
Moore) with the 'explode' button had to
run for his life as the Aston was heading
for him, so they employed the services
of an excellent body building firm in
Turin, who dressed up a Lancia Flaminia 3c Cabriolet. (Not a Lancia
Appia Cabriolet nor an Alfa Romeo
which many have noted). You can tell when
the car flips down the gorge, because
the bonnet opens with the hinge at the
windscreen end, whereas the real DB4 bonnet
hinges at the headlight end - as seen
when Charlie recovers his money from the
engine bay after getting out of the nick.
They were having difficulty actually getting
the Aston over the wall, so bus driver
Fred Toms dressed up like one of the mob
and did the job! Rumours have it that
the Aston has been restored, but there
is no info available at the time of writing.
Charlie collects Aston
|
Lancia
Flaminia 3c Cabriolet was dressed up
like the DB4 |
Both E-Types |
Director Peter
Collinson sledgehammers the black
E-Type for the right effect! |
Aston Martin
DB4 meets Caterpillar 944A |
Fake DB4 down
the gorge |
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