Bad A$$ Fintail in Bond Movie

[joshhol]

I walked in halfway through a scene in "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" where a dark colored Euro 220 or 230S is being smashed and raced in some kind of ice rinked demolition derby.
They specifically focused on one shot where the RF Euro light was smashed out colliding with the other cars!
Apparently the bad guys were in the Fintail, slipping and sliding, shooting at Bond. It was getting smashed up, but they were driving it hard and it looked Great doing it, up until the bad guys lost control, ran into the barrier and flipped it. It would have been fine but they detonated some cheesy charge to make it look like the car had blown up and I felt that the Mercedes engineers would have been perturbed at that point.

Nothing is cooler than seeing a Fintail in its heyday on screen.

It's hard to beat a good Mercury Cougar.

[Mark DiSilvestro]

6 cylinder Fintails used to be a favorite 'German Gangster Car' in movies and on TV.

There's a good scene early on, in the mid '70s movie 'Marathon Man', involving an elderly German in a 220S Fintail and an elderly Jewish guy in a '69 Chevy getting into a road-rage race through the streets of Brooklyn. The race ends with BOTH cars and drivers getting incinerated by colliding with a heating-oil truck.

Also look for great Fintail footage in the 1984 British film 'The Hit' where John Hurt and Tim Roth kidnap Terence Stamp and wind up driving a 220S (or 230S) getaway car through Spain. (One of my favorite Fintail films as my Dad's first Benz was a '61 220S while we were stationed in Spain in the early '60s!)

I also have some Fintail scenes in a couple of episodes of the '60s British TV series 'The Saint'. Both times, driven by gangsters!

Happy Motoring, Mark

[300SDog]

Excellent film festival - the cable J.Bond T-day series.... just watched "Octopussy". Some 114s in background and bad guy just drove away in 116.

Mark, am wondering if you heard where MB corporate policy said they were fed up with seeing their cars wrecked by bad guys in motion pictures.

Another flick - "Dogs of War", i think it was, showed one helluva chase scene in bombed out Lebanon where Navy Seal Team escaped in 116 under attack from machine guns and RPGs. The car was wrecked, but at least it was the good guys behind the wheel.

Does anybody else remember hearing MB representative say that too many of their cars were being destroyed by villians in movies?

[Mark DiSilvestro]

I don't know about recently, but I recall a news article from about 20 years ago, where Mercedes complained about their cars being used as 'gangster-rides' on TV and movies. I kind of like the 'dark edge' reputation myself. I see alot more BMWs playing the gangster role these days.

For more film Fintail fun, (and 240DieselDog, something that should be right up your alley) look for the 1963 film 'The Prize'. Near the end of the film, Paul Newman, Elke Sommer and Edward G. Robinson escape from their would-be Communist captors by being winched out of the Fintail-filled hold of a German freighter, in a 190D.
After the car's safely on the dock, great fun watching Elke instruct Paul on how to start and column-shift that Diesel while he's laying on top of her on the car floor.

Happy Motoring, Mark

...the "bad guys" who staff Goldfinger's Swiss factory which Bond has infiltrated chase his Aston-Martin in an assortment of Mercedes "roundies" and fintails...most of which succumb to the oil slicks and other Q-installed "options". Interesting "day for night" photography.

In "Diamonds Are Forever" Charles Grey (Blofeld, in drag) is whisked away from the Las Vegas casino in a 600.

Bond movies have showcased some very strange rolling stock, including the AMC Pacer.

[Mark DiSilvestro]

I still have that old news clipping somewhere.
As I recall, the 600 was one of the models that Mercedes complained was getting too much negative exposure. AND, speaking of which, who can forget the 600 an enraged Jack Nicholson thoroughly trashed while persuing the female leads in 'The Witches of Eastwick'!

Happy Motoring, Mark

and who can forget Cary Grant's bourbon-fueled ride in the ponton cabriolet in "North by Northwest"?

"Roger, you didn't borrow Laura's Mercedes"!?

Except for the 600, Mercedes postwar products have been too stolidly upper middle class to be truly evil.

The made-for-TV movie "Fatherland," which takes place in a what-if-Germany-had-won-WWII 1960 has a LOT of very nice period Benzes, including a spectacular '50s 300 coupe.

[Mark DiSilvestro]

Well, maybe it wasn't "truly evil", but I recall an 'Adenauer' Mercedes 300 starred in the cheapie '60s horror flick 'They Saved Hitler's Brain!'.
Renting that car probably took a big chunk out of the budget.

Happy Motoring, Mark

[joshhol]

Great!

There was a movie starring Antonio Banderos, set in Israel, where the bones of Jesus were thought to have been discovered. Antonio, driving and old Fintail, chases after some bad guys in a late model Beamer or something like that. The Finnie holds its own for being a 40 year old car! I forget the name of the movie though.

On the Heckflosse site, there is a Pearl Green Fintail that is stated to have been in the Will Smith movie "Ali".

Mark- I saw "The Marathon Man". The guy in the chevy calls the ex- Nazi in the fintail a "Mercedes bastard"! They also show Scheider riding around in a W114 250 or the like.

Then there was another Bond movie where they hop into a nice 250 to chase some guys but cant find the keys! They end up roasting some other forgettable car.

Nothing cooler than seeing Any old Benz in it's heyday on screen!
A dark Fintail at night is easily one of the most sinister looking cars made!

PaulC- Post a pic of the Cougar if you have one. I'm not familiar with it.

[Mark DiSilvestro]

Joshhol,
Sad thing is...that Fintail in 'Marathon Man' was probably in much better shape than mine, at least until it got incinerated. Those cars were $200 beaters back in the early '70s. That's what my 180b cost in 1973. Two years later, my Dad did even better, paying $150 for a '60 220SE Fintail, including a sunroof and a working Becker Mexico AM/FM tube radio!

Happy Motoring, Mark

[joshhol]

200 Bucks!

They must have been a dime a dozen. People must have driven the piss outta them and put em away wet. Sad.

I saw a really rough looking black one in Berkeley today. You can't say it lacked character. It was really beat up, probably would go for 150.

The only shot I could find of the Cougar featured in On Her Majesty's Secret Service . It is a 1969 Mercury Cougar XR7 convertible.

[joshhol]

PaulC

That was the car Bond was in that the Fintail was after, no?
Perhaps not because I think it wasn't a convertible.

Sweet, looks like something Steve McQueen would drive.

Don't know what it was I was watching today with Gene Hackman that had a Euro W123 taxi chasing after somebody.
No need to add artificial engine revs for that one.

[Mark DiSilvestro]

And don't forget the 1966 film 'Arabesque' starring Gregory Peck, with the glamorous Sophia Loren eluding spys and agents in her gorgeous red 230SL.

Happy Motoring, Mark