When it comes right down to it, sometimes people just
aren’t as interesting as their cars.
The trailer for “Torque” hails the new Ice Cube-led
motorcycle extravaganza as coming from the producers of “The
Fast and the Furious,” and rightly so. As the sleeper success
of 2001, “The Fast and the Furious” seemed to
single-handedly create a new subgenre of filmmaking: the car movie,
in which acting and story take a distinct back seat to action
sequences showing off a plethora of highly stylized motor
vehicles.
But according to film historian and UCLA film Professor Jonathan
Kuntz, the car movie has a well-established tradition in American
filmmaking.
“Looking back to the ’50s and ’60s, we can
talk about films about car culture, with hot rods and James
Dean’s famous Mercury in “˜Rebel Without a
Cause,'” he said.
While “Rebel Without a Cause” may not seem to be a
car movie at first glance, the prominence of Dean’s character
Jim Stark’s ride in the film marked Dean’s closeness
with American youth at the time.
“Rebel Without a Cause” used cars in a teen-angst
drama to resonate with young people; similarly, “The Fast and
the Furious” uses very specific present-day stylized cars to
resonate with its targeted audience of young action film
enthusiasts.
“The car culture has such a significant presence, and cars
have such an influence with young people, who are such a core
audience of the action genre,” Kuntz said.
According to Kuntz, Hollywood’s fascination with cars
makes sense. Located in Los Angeles, a city heavily reliant on
automobiles, the film industry sees how important they are to
American culture on a daily basis. Also, because nice cars have
become a symbol for being cool in much of youth culture, Hollywood
filmmakers can use them to tap into that large demographic.
Once “The Fast and the Furious” proved its success,
sequels and spin-offs became inevitable. And although somewhat
counterintuitive, movies like “Torque” actually can be
easier to make than other action movies targeted at the same
demographic.
“Cars don’t talk back, but actors do,” said
Myrl Schreibman, an adjunct film production professor at UCLA.
“(With cars,) you don’t have the personality problems
you do with actors. It’s not that it’s cheaper, but it
becomes a more controllable environment.”
Still, Schreibman agrees that in the grand scheme of American
filmmaking, the recent wave of car-heavy action movies isn’t
all that new and won’t necessarily last all that long. Citing
“Christine,” a 1983 John Carpenter film in which an
evil car takes over the life of its owner, Schreibman feels the car
movie is like any other kind of movie.
“When someone hits a formula, everyone wants to follow
that formula,” he said. “It will hibernate eventually,
and then it will come out again.”
The question, then, is how long such movies will continue to
play before feeling too tired and stale, which only will lead to
questioning when the time will come to bring them back again. Some
feel that “Torque” already has worn out its welcome as
a movie driven by the performance of its high-powered motors.
“I would watch it just because I love Ice Cube,”
said Berna Kamyar, a second-year political science and Spanish
student. “But as far as the cars go, it feels too
regurgitated. Unless you’re obsessed with cars, I don’t
see why you’d want to see it for its plot.”