Smokey & The Bandit Police Cars. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for 1975 Plymouth Fury Police Pursuit Arkansas State Police "Smokey and The Bandit" at the best online prices at eBay! The commercials were produced after Stewart mentioned that the movie was one of his favorites.[39]. Neither Buford nor any other lawmen know of Snowman's illegal manifest, while Bandit is likewise unaware that Buford is chasing him because of Carrie, whose jumpiness inspires Bandit to give her the CB handle "Frog". Unfortunately he passed away a few months ago or that would have been a great question to ask. Gleason was given free rein to ad-lib dialogue and make suggestions. Here are 20 facts about the Trans Am from Smokey and the Bandit. Coors is still brewed just outside Denver, Colorado. Check out the entire video below. I also own a 1:18 scale version of the Bandit Trans Am. The change was somewhat strange as most automakers were using cubic-inch numerals to advertise engines. Every idiot with more money than brains wanted a Trans Am. (Still). I just dont like car novices that assume the Pontiac T/A was soley a movie tie in car and the it started in 1977.. While watching the movie (yes, I did have to diligently research this article), one shot seemed to indicate this may be a dummy scoop. About two seconds after this picture was taken, these motorcycles were doing their best imitation of a stack of pancakes. Smokey and the Bandit II - Wikipedia When Smokey & The Bandit first aired on television in the early 1980s, the Gleason phrase "sum bitch"-a regional butchering of "son of a bitch"-had to be dubbed out. [10], Principal photography of the film began on August 30, 1976. I remember that it had a bunch of trim badges on the center of the dashboard. Bill Justis is the first name on the credits for the soundtrack, as he composed and arranged original music throughout the film. Behind Sheriff Justices Pontiac, there is a nice looking 1965 or 1966 Ford Mustang fastback and a Toyota pickup. You can see in some shots in the movie that the Bandit Trans Am has 1976 style gold honeycomb wheels instead of the gold snowflake wheels from the 1977, I think at least one of the cars used in filming was a 1976 converted with a 1977 front clip. Sales jumped even higher in 1979 when Pontiac moved 117,108 Trans Ams. The next movie, Smokey and the Bandit II, featured the same cast and an updated version of the Trans Am.The second version of the Smokey and the Bandit car was a 1980 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am that had a similar paint job, the updated front end, and gold "Turbine" style wheels.The 1980 models featured a turbocharged 4.9L Pontiac V8, but that still wasn't enough power for the stunt personnel. It made no sense to me as it was fifty miles north and fifty miles south. A 1975 Pontiac Grand Prix with a Buick Electra behind it. By the end of June, it had played in major Southern markets, including Charlotte, Atlanta, Jacksonville, New Orleans, Memphis, Dallas, and Oklahoma City, grossing $11.9 million. I really enjoyed this discussion. If they werent burning candles to an image of a cowboy hatted Burt Reynolds at Pontiac headquarters. Dont let his grumpiness fool you though; hes more than excited to provide the latest news and reviews on the most interesting cars in the industry. That parking lot was full of Trans Ams! Nah, they survived by coming up with bras with very thin cups. Nuts about any form of classic motorsport and muscle cars, Ciprian's currently working on a time machine that would take him back to the 1960s for a long vacation alongside Dan Gurney and Jim Hall. I was in the Air Force during this era, stationed in California. Smokey and the Bandit | East Bound and Down - YouTube Have the movie, cheesy as hell, but does have appearances by several NASCAR drivers of the day, including Dale Earnhardt (Senior, not Jr) Kyle Petty, Harry Gant, and one of my favorites of the era, Tim Richmond. Launched on the big screen in 1977, Smokey and the Bandit revolves around two bootleggers as they attempt to illegally transport 400 cases of Coors beer from Texarkana to Atlanta. I was just tweaking Jason. Smokey And The Bandit Tribute Jump Goes About As Well As You'd Expect It took four evenings to see almost all of the movie in bits and pieces. The truck at the shell station is actually a 75 or 76 Toyota Hilux. The 1977 Firebird Trans Am once owned by Burt Reynolds was sold at auction Saturday for $495,000 at a sale held by Barrett-Jackson. Weve got a long way to go and a short time to get there I know that Trans Am that jumped that bridge broke the axle when it landed. The paint code for each truck was coffee brown with gold trims and the 48-foot (15m) mural trailer used was manufactured by Hobbs Trailers in Texas with a non-operational Thermo King Refrigeration unit. Thank you for signing up to CinemaBlend. The comedy has been remastered to DVD standards. The Kenworth even achieves a trifecta of sorts, as it gave the first dent to Sheriff Justices LeMans. The sound came from a 1955 Chevrolet Custom, the same car that was used in Two-Lane Blacktop and American Graffiti, films launched in 1971 and 1973, respectively. It consists of any of the various Louisiana-style hot sauces on Texas toast-style bread alongside the fourth most famous product of Pittsburg, Texas (behind Pilgrim's Pride, Cavender's, and Carroll Shelby)Pittsburg Hot Links. One of those things that will make my kids think Im crazy some day. I was 10 when this movie came out and I loved it then and I still do. The 403 Olds T/A was a dog, stock, but with some easily obtained parts, could be turned into a very nice low 13 second tire melter. Olds 88. During their run, they are pursued by Texas county sheriff Buford T. Justice (Gleason). Its amazing, you should watch it. 1975 Plymouth Fury Police Pursuit Arkansas State Police "Smokey and The Smokey and the Bandit star Burt Reynolds passed away in 2018 . [32], After the debut of the film, the Pontiac Trans Am became wildly popular, with sales almost doubling within two years of the film's release. As a feature-length car chase, the car was as much of a star as Burt Reynolds, and the film gave birth to the cult of the Trans Am. The T/A is just as quick as my present Challenger is, but the Challenger doesnt have anything close to the throttle response it had, and I miss it. The pair arrive in Texarkana one hour early and load up the truck, but just as they head back, Carrie, a runaway bride, intercepts Bandit and jumps in his car, unwittingly making him an indirect target of Sheriff Buford T. Justice, a career Texas lawman whose witless son Junior was to have married Carrie. Smokey and the Bandit: Behind-the-Scenes Details With - MotorTrend I started cruising through EBay and the next thing I knew I won the auction for a clean 400/4 speed/T-Top 78 Trans Am. It is now sold in all states as Coors ships it in refrigerated train cars and bottled locally and sold in different parts of the country including the eastern US states. The scoops were added by the department because the engines ran so hot. There was a problem. But while the cars shown in the movie look like 1977-model-year Trans Ams, they were actually 1976 models. . Many hardcore fans of Burt Reynolds' most iconic movie, 1977's "Smokey and The Bandit," know that none of those cool black Pontiac Trans Ams with gold trim survived the stunts in the film. East bound and down, loaded up and truckin A CC for a 1973 Grand Ville convertible can be found here. The original uncut sumbitch version. Most of the dialogue was improvised on set. [30] Upon meeting Reynolds, Billy Bob Thornton told him that the South considers the film to be less cinema and more documentary. Although he's into just about any type of vehicle, Ciprian is not your typical car enthusiast. Rockford Files also featured Firebird, and was on since 1974, and Fs sold well despite gas crunch I and inflation. Burt Reynolds once claimed in an interview that there were actually 12 Trans Ams featured in Smokey and the Banditand he wrecked every one. Not a bad deal, but on the fourth year, no new car. Thats all true. It airs on cable tv all the time. Of course, nobody else cared if it was in the trunk of the car when heading back home. It was the second-highest-grossing movie of 1977 after Star Wars. Visit our corporate site (opens in new tab). [23] It then opened in just the South of the United States over the Memorial Day weekend and grossed $2,689,851 in 386 theaters. At the time, using "fuck" would immediately require an R rating and this self-censorship allowed the film to avoid this rating and reach a much larger audience. The Ridiculous Number Of Cars Burt Reynolds Burned - CINEMABLEND As luck and script writing would have it, Frog has left her groom at the altar. I recall a big smokey burnout right after they left Snowmans house that looked 455-worthy and also after Bandit picked up Fields he left two strips after nailing second (right before the tire thieves crossed the road), which makes me think there was also a 4 speed car used. Though no authoritative source identifies the composition of the sandwich, there are several possibilities. The film features the custom clothing and costuming of Niver Western Wear of Fort Worth, Texas. Smokey and the Bandit Pursuit Pack 1 2 3 DVD Burt Reynolds Cult Car The second film was a modest box office success, earning $66.1 million against a $17 million budget. Here in Canada they didnt censor it, so we always got the sumbitch version. The production team wrecked three for the four cars it received from Pontiac. In 2006, a DVD re-release was issued of Smokey and the Bandit featuring a digitally remastered audio track with 5.1 Dolby-compatible surround sound. The MASSIVE year over year sales gains came from somewhere. Buford, with Junior along, ignores his jurisdiction and doggedly chases Bandit all the way to Georgia to retrieve Carrie while various mishaps cause his cruiser to disintegrate on the way. Film critic Leonard Maltin gave the film a good rating (3 stars out of a possible 4) and characterized it as "about as subtle as The Three Stooges, but a classic compared to the sequels and countless rip-offs which followed". The 1977 model wasn't out yet when filming began, so General Motors provided 1976 cars with front clips from the soon-to-be-released 1977 update. How many cars did they wreck in Smokey and the Bandit? Sales almost doubled in two years, which is a very big deal given that the Trans Ams 1978 facelift was rather minor save for the front fascia. However, in more recent years, the original version has been shown (on ITV, a commercial channel), usually with the stronger language edited out, often quite awkwardly. All I know is, at the time, if you lived in the east, Coors was some really special beer not unlike microbrews are now. After passing Buford's badly damaged cruiser on the roadside, Bandit gets on the CB and initially directs him to the Burdettes, but then respectfully gives his real locationright behind Buford, who continues his chase leaving Junior behind, and with more parts falling off his cruiser as he limps off after Bandit. Originally, the film was going to be a B-movie played only in the Southern United States. I know that Trans Am that . They destroyed all those cars in the films he said. My family did all grocery shopping in Cape. The third-generation Firebird was introduced in 1982, a full two years later than planned. I recall reading somewhere that the Trans Am that did the bridge jump had a tweaked Chevy 350 in it with a stick, and of course that it was WO after the jump. The site's consensus states: "Not much in the head but plenty beneath the hood, Smokey and the Bandit is infectious fun with plenty of car wrecks to keep your eyes glued". I agree, despite people saying you sound cute, it seems like they think Ellie Mae Clapett or Jethro Bodean. The film's theme song, "East Bound and Down", was written virtually overnight by Reed. [35], The "diablo sandwich" ordered by Sheriff Justice in the Arkansas barbecue restaurant scene has entered popular culture as a minor reference to the film.