Bullitt
Encyclopedia
Bullitt is a 1968 American police procedural
film starring Steve McQueen
, Jacqueline Bisset
and Robert Vaughn
. It was directed
by Peter Yates
and distributed by Warner Bros.
The story was adapted for the screen by Alan Trustman and Harry Kleiner, based on the 1963 novel
Mute Witness by Robert L. Fish, a pseudonym for Robert L. Pike. Lalo Schifrin
wrote the original jazz
-inspired score
, arranged for brass
and percussion
. Robert Duvall
has a small part as a cab driver who provides information to McQueen.
The film won the Academy Award
for Best Film Editing
(Frank P. Keller) and was nominated for Best Sound
. Writers Trustman and Kleiner won a 1969 Edgar Award
from the Mystery Writers of America
for Best Motion Picture Screenplay. Bullitt is notable for its car chase
scene through the streets of San Francisco
, regarded as one of the most influential car chase sequences in movie history.
In 2007, Bullitt was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry
by the Library of Congress
as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In 2008 Ford produced the Mustang Bullit model for the 40th anniversary of the film. The Bullit nameplate on the steering wheel honored the movie that made the Mustang one of the most popular cars of the 1960s and 1970s. The green color was also brought back for the anniversary edition.
) is holding a Senate subcommittee hearing in San Francisco on organized crime
in America
. To improve his political standing, Chalmers hopes to bring down Chicago
mobster Pete Ross (Vic Tayback
) with the aid of key witness Johnny Ross, Pete's brother. Bullitt takes place the weekend before the hearing, from Friday night (during the opening credits) to Sunday night.
Following his theft of $2,000,000 in mob money and subsequent escape from Chicago to San Francisco, Johnny (Felice Orlandi) is placed in the San Francisco Police Department
's protective custody for the weekend. Chalmers requests Lieutenant Frank Bullitt's (Steve McQueen
) unit to guard him.
Bullitt, Sergeant Delgetti (Don Gordon) and Detective Carl Stanton (Carl Reindel
), give Ross around-the-clock protection at the Hotel Daniels, a cheap flophouse
near the Embarcadero Freeway. Late Saturday night, a pair of hitmen (Paul Genge
and stunt driver Bill Hickman
), burst into the room and shoot both Inspector Stanton and Ross, seriously wounding them both.
Bullitt wants to investigate who shot the pair and find the Mafia boss who ordered the hit. Upset, Chalmers attempts to shift blame on to Bullitt and the San Francisco Police Department. Ross subsequently dies of his wounds. Bullitt suppresses news of the death, asking Doctor Willard (Georg Stanford Brown
) to misplace the chart and have the body placed in the morgue
under a John Doe
identity.
Chalmers arrives at the hospital on Sunday morning and is angered that Ross has disappeared. He is further incensed when he and his police minion Captain Baker (Norman Fell
) receive no help from Bullitt. Chalmers places pressure on Bullitt to produce Ross, to no effect.
Bullitt reconstructs Ross's movements, finding his way to a hotel where he finds a woman registered under the name Dorothy Simmons (Brandy Carroll). With the hearing the next day, Bullitt suspects the dead mobster may not be who he seems. After picking up his Ford Mustang
, Bullitt is tailed by the two hitmen, resulting in a famous car chase that ultimately kills the hitmen.
Back at the police station, Bullitt is interrogated, and is given until Monday morning to follow his remaining lead. He begins to investigate Simmons, but discovers that she has been murdered. Later, Bullitt and Delgetti learn that Simmons's true identity was Dorothy Rennick, and that the murdered man that they knew as Ross may in fact be her husband, Albert, a car salesman with no police record. Bullitt requests a copy of Rennick's passport, hoping to prove this theory.
Chalmers arrives at the morgue, demanding, from Bullitt, a signed admission that Ross died while in his custody. Bullitt demurs, and when the faxed copy of the Rennicks' passport photos arrives, Chalmers is shown to have sent the police to protect the wrong man. The real Ross set Rennick up in order to escape, then killed Rennick's wife to silence her. Chalmers later tries to smooth things over by offering Bullitt a chance to further his career, which Bullitt refuses.
Bullitt's partner discovers that the Rennicks have tickets to fly to Rome that night. They go to the airport, where Bullitt discovers the real Johnny Ross (Pat Renella) and pursues him. A chase across the working runways of San Francisco Airport ensues, with Bullitt eventually shooting and killing Ross after chasing him back into the terminal.
At the time of the film's release, the car chase scene generated a great amount of excitement. Leonard Maltin
has called it a "now-classic car chase, one of the screen's all-time best." Emanuel Levy
wrote in 2003 that, "Bullitt contains one of the most exciting car chases in film history, a sequence that revolutionized Hollywood's standards." In his obituary for Peter Yates, Bruce Weber wrote "Mr. Yates’s reputation probably rests most securely on “Bullitt” (1968), his first American film — and indeed, on one particular scene, an extended car chase that instantly became a classic." The editing of this scene likely won editor Frank P. Keller
the Academy Award for Best Editing.
Later, producer Philip D'Antoni
filmed two more car chases for The French Connection
and The Seven-Ups
, both set and filmed in New York City.
and locations around and on Filbert and University Streets. The scene ends at the Guadalupe Canyon Parkway in Brisbane, out of the city.
Two 1968 390 CID V8 Ford Mustang
s (325 bhp) with four-speed manual transmission were used for the chase scene, both owned by Ford Motor Company and part of a promotional loan agreement with Warner Bros. The Mustangs' engines, brakes and suspensions were heavily modified for the chase by veteran car racer Max Balchowsky. Ford Motor Company had also originally loaned two Ford Galaxie
sedans that were intended to be used in the chase scenes, but the producers found the cars entirely too heavy to put through jumps over the hills of San Francisco without the cars' suspensions being severely damaged. The Galaxie sedans were replaced with two 1968 440 CID/375 bhp Dodge Charger
s (three-speed automatic transmission) that were bought outright from Glendale Dodge in Glendale, California
. The engines in both Chargers were left largely unmodified, but the suspension was mildly upgraded to cope with the demands of the stunt work.
The director called for speeds of about 75–80 mph (33.5–35.8 ), but the cars (including the ones containing the cameras) reached speeds of over 110 miles per hour (49.2 m/s) on surface streets. Driver's point-of-view angles were used to give the audience the "feel" of the ride as the cars jumped the hills. Filming the chase scene took three weeks, resulting in 9 minutes and 42 seconds of film. During this film sequence, the Charger loses five wheel covers and has different ones missing in different shots. As a result of shooting from multiple angles simultaneously, and some angles' footage used at different times to give the illusion of different streets, the speeding cars can be seen passing the same green Volkswagen Beetle
four different times, and the same blue Chevelle Malibu S.S.396 with a black vinyl top three times. The Charger also crashes into the camera in one scene and the damaged front fender is noticeable in later scenes. After the Charger hits a parked car, it disappears for a split second from the screen before the scene is changed. The San Francisco authorities did not let the filmmakers film the car chase on the Golden Gate Bridge, but they did permit the passage to be filmed in Midtown locations including the Mission District, and in neighboring Brisbane, on the city's outskirts.
McQueen, an accomplished driver, drove in the close-up
scenes, about 10% of the chase in the film. The stunt coordinator, Carey Loftin
, hired stuntman
and motorcycle racer Bud Ekins
, and McQueen's usual stunt driver Loren Janes, to do the dangerous stunts in the Mustang. Ekins is also the stunt man who lays down his bike in front of a skidding truck during the chase (Ekins also doubled for McQueen in the sequence of The Great Escape
in which McQueen's character jumps over a barbed wire fence on a motorcycle). The Mustang’s interior rear view mirror goes up and down depending on who is driving; when the mirror is up (visible) McQueen is behind the wheel, and when it is down (not visible) Ekins is driving. The black Dodge Charger was driven by Bill Hickman
, who also played one of the hitmen and helped with the choreography of the chase scene. The other hitman was played by Paul Genge
who had played another character who rode a Dodge off the road to his death in an episode of Perry Mason
- "The Case of the Sausalito Sunrise" two years earlier.
Of the two Mustangs, one was scrapped after filming due to liability concerns and the surviving backup car was sold to an employee of Warner Brothers' editing department. The car changed hands several times, and Steve McQueen at one point made an unsuccessful attempt to buy it. The Mustang is rumored to have been kept in a barn in the Ohio River Valley by an unknown owner.
likely won Keller the editing Oscar for 1968, and has been included in lists of the "Best Editing Sequences of All-Time". Paul Monaco has written, "The most compelling street footage of 1968, however, appeared in an entirely contrived sequence, with nary a hint of documentary feel about it -- the car chase through the streets of San Francisco in Bullitt, created from footage shot over nearly five weeks. Billy Fraker, the cinematographer for the film, attributed the success of the chase sequence primarily to the work of the editor, Frank P. Keller. At the time, Keller was credited with cutting the piece in such a superb manner that he made the city of San Francisco a "character" in the film." The editing of the scene was not without difficulties; Ralph Rosenblum wrote in 1979 that "those who care about such things may know that during the filming of the climactic chase scene in Bullitt, an out-of-control car filled with dummies tripped a wire which prematurely sent a costly set up in flames, and that editor Frank Keller salvaged the near-catastrophe with a clever and unusual juxtaposition of images that made the explosion appear to go off on time." This chase scene has also been cited by critics as groundbreaking in its realism and originality.
made the film a NYT Critics Pick, saying its a "terrific movie, just right for Steve McQueen—fast, well acted, written the way people talk"; accord to Adler, "the ending should satisfy fans from Dragnet
to Camus
."
Among 21st century critics, it holds a 97% "fresh"rating on Rotten Tomatoes
, representing positive reviews from 32 of 33 critics as of October 2011. In 2004, The New York Times
placed the film on its list of The Best 1000 Movies Ever Made. In 2011, Time magazine listed it among the "The 15 Greatest Movie Car Chases of All Time", describing it as "the one, the first, the granddaddy, the chase on the top of almost every list", and saying "Bullitt‘s car chase is a reminder that every great such scene is a triumph of editing as much as it is stuntwork. Naturally, it won that year’s Academy Award for Best Editing."
, including Best Director
for Peter Yates, Best Supporting Actor
for Robert Vaughn, Best Cinematography
for William A. Fraker
, Best Film Editing
for Frank P. Keller, and Best Sound Track
. Keller also won the American Cinema Editors Eddie Award for Best Edited Feature Film. The film was awarded the National Society of Film Critics Award
for Best Cinematography (William A. Fraker) and the Golden Reel Award
for Best Sound Editing - Feature Film. The film was also successful at the 1970 Laurel Awards
. It won 2nd place Golden Laurel awards for Best Action Drama, Best Action Performance (Steve McQueen) and Best Female New Face (Jacqueline Bisset). In 2000, the Society of Camera Operators
awarded Bullitt its "Historical Shot" award to David M. Walsh. Alan Trustman and Harry Kleiner won that year's Edgar Award
for Best Mystery Screenplay. In 2001, the American Film Institute
found Bullitt to be the #36 on its list of thrillers.
released the Bullitt edition Ford Mustang GT Another version of the Ford Mustang Bullitt, which is closer to resembling the original film Mustang, was released in 2008.
Steve McQueen's likeness as Frank Bullitt was used in two Ford commercials. The first was for the Europe-only 2001 Ford Puma
, which featured McQueen driving the car around San Francisco before parking it in a studio apartment garage beside the film Mustang and the motorcycle from The Great Escape
. In a 2004 commercial for the 2005 Mustang, McQueen appears and drives the new Mustang after a man receives a Field of Dreams
-style epiphany and constructs a racetrack in the middle of a cornfield.
Police procedural
The police procedural is a subgenre of detective fiction which attempts to convincingly depict the activities of a police force as they investigate crimes. While traditional detective novels usually concentrate on a single crime, police procedurals frequently depict investigations into several...
film starring Steve McQueen
Steve McQueen
Terrence Steven "Steve" McQueen was an American movie actor. He was nicknamed "The King of Cool." His "anti-hero" persona, which he developed at the height of the Vietnam counterculture, made him one of the top box-office draws of the 1960s and 1970s. McQueen received an Academy Award nomination...
, Jacqueline Bisset
Jacqueline Bisset
Jacqueline Bisset is an English actress. She has been nominated for four Golden Globe Awards and an Emmy Award. She is known for her roles in the films Bullitt , Airport , The Deep , Class , and the TV series Nip/Tuck in 2006...
and Robert Vaughn
Robert Vaughn
Robert Francis Vaughn, , is an American actor noted for stage, film and television work. His best known roles include the suave spy Napoleon Solo in the 1960s television series The Man from U.N.C.L.E., wealthy detective Harry Rule in the 1970s television series The Protectors, Albert Stroller in...
. It was directed
Film director
A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...
by Peter Yates
Peter Yates
Peter James Yates was an English director and producer. He was born in Aldershot, Hampshire.The son of an army officer, he attended Charterhouse School as a boy, graduated from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and worked for some years as an actor, director and stage manager...
and distributed by Warner Bros.
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...
The story was adapted for the screen by Alan Trustman and Harry Kleiner, based on the 1963 novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
Mute Witness by Robert L. Fish, a pseudonym for Robert L. Pike. Lalo Schifrin
Lalo Schifrin
Lalo Schifrin is an Argentine composer, pianist and conductor. He is best known for his film and TV scores, such as the "Theme from Mission: Impossible". He has received four Grammy Awards and six Oscar nominations...
wrote the original jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
-inspired score
Film score
A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film, forming part of the film's soundtrack, which also usually includes dialogue and sound effects...
, arranged for brass
Brass instrument
A brass instrument is a musical instrument whose sound is produced by sympathetic vibration of air in a tubular resonator in sympathy with the vibration of the player's lips...
and percussion
Percussion instrument
A percussion instrument is any object which produces a sound when hit with an implement or when it is shaken, rubbed, scraped, or otherwise acted upon in a way that sets the object into vibration...
. Robert Duvall
Robert Duvall
Robert Selden Duvall is an American actor and director. He has won an Academy Award, two Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards and a BAFTA over the course of his career....
has a small part as a cab driver who provides information to McQueen.
The film won the Academy Award
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
for Best Film Editing
Academy Award for Film Editing
The Academy Award for Film Editing is one of the annual awards of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Nominations for this award are closely correlated with the Academy Award for Best Picture. Since 1981, every film selected as Best Picture has also been nominated for the Film Editing...
(Frank P. Keller) and was nominated for Best Sound
Academy Award for Sound
The Academy Award for Sound Mixing is an Academy Award that recognizes the finest or most euphonic sound mixing or recording, and is generally awarded to the production sound mixers and re-recording mixers of the winning film. Compare this award to the Academy Award for Sound Editing...
. Writers Trustman and Kleiner won a 1969 Edgar Award
Edgar Award
The Edgar Allan Poe Awards , named after Edgar Allan Poe, are presented every year by the Mystery Writers of America...
from the Mystery Writers of America
Mystery Writers of America
Mystery Writers of America is an organization for mystery writers, based in New York.The organization was founded in 1945 by Clayton Rawson, Anthony Boucher, Lawrence Treat, and Brett Halliday....
for Best Motion Picture Screenplay. Bullitt is notable for its car chase
Car chase
A car chase is the vehicular pursuit of a suspect by law enforcement officers. Car chases are often captured on film and broadcast due to the availability of video footage recorded by police cars and police and media helicopters participating in the chase...
scene through the streets of San Francisco
San Francisco, California
San Francisco , officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the financial, cultural, and transportation center of the San Francisco Bay Area, a region of 7.15 million people which includes San Jose and Oakland...
, regarded as one of the most influential car chase sequences in movie history.
In 2007, Bullitt was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry
National Film Registry
The National Film Registry is the United States National Film Preservation Board's selection of films for preservation in the Library of Congress. The Board, established by the National Film Preservation Act of 1988, was reauthorized by acts of Congress in 1992, 1996, 2005, and again in October 2008...
by the Library of Congress
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...
as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In 2008 Ford produced the Mustang Bullit model for the 40th anniversary of the film. The Bullit nameplate on the steering wheel honored the movie that made the Mustang one of the most popular cars of the 1960s and 1970s. The green color was also brought back for the anniversary edition.
Plot
Ambitious politician Walter Chalmers (Robert VaughnRobert Vaughn
Robert Francis Vaughn, , is an American actor noted for stage, film and television work. His best known roles include the suave spy Napoleon Solo in the 1960s television series The Man from U.N.C.L.E., wealthy detective Harry Rule in the 1970s television series The Protectors, Albert Stroller in...
) is holding a Senate subcommittee hearing in San Francisco on organized crime
Organized crime
Organized crime or criminal organizations are transnational, national, or local groupings of highly centralized enterprises run by criminals for the purpose of engaging in illegal activity, most commonly for monetary profit. Some criminal organizations, such as terrorist organizations, are...
in America
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. To improve his political standing, Chalmers hopes to bring down Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
mobster Pete Ross (Vic Tayback
Vic Tayback
Victor "Vic" Tayback was an American actor.-Life and career:Tayback was born in Brooklyn, New York City, New York, the son of Helen and Najeeb James Tayback. His parents were immigrants from Aleppo, Syria. Tayback moved with his family to Burbank, California, during his teenage years and attended...
) with the aid of key witness Johnny Ross, Pete's brother. Bullitt takes place the weekend before the hearing, from Friday night (during the opening credits) to Sunday night.
Following his theft of $2,000,000 in mob money and subsequent escape from Chicago to San Francisco, Johnny (Felice Orlandi) is placed in the San Francisco Police Department
San Francisco Police Department
The San Francisco Police Department, also known as the SFPD and San Francisco Department Of Police, is the police department of the City and County of San Francisco, California...
's protective custody for the weekend. Chalmers requests Lieutenant Frank Bullitt's (Steve McQueen
Steve McQueen
Terrence Steven "Steve" McQueen was an American movie actor. He was nicknamed "The King of Cool." His "anti-hero" persona, which he developed at the height of the Vietnam counterculture, made him one of the top box-office draws of the 1960s and 1970s. McQueen received an Academy Award nomination...
) unit to guard him.
Bullitt, Sergeant Delgetti (Don Gordon) and Detective Carl Stanton (Carl Reindel
Carl Reindel
Carl Warren Reindel was an American actor, best known for portraying Lieutenant Kenneth M. Taylor in the epic war film Tora! Tora! Tora!. Reindel also played "Stanton" in Steve McQueen's hit film Bullitt and "Lt. Comroe" in classic science fiction film The Andromeda Strain...
), give Ross around-the-clock protection at the Hotel Daniels, a cheap flophouse
Flophouse
A flophouse , doss-house or dosshouse is a place that offers very cheap lodging, generally by providing only minimal services.-Characteristics:...
near the Embarcadero Freeway. Late Saturday night, a pair of hitmen (Paul Genge
Paul Genge
Paul Morgan Genge was an actor from the 1950s through to the late 1970s. Genge is most famous for his role as the shotgun toting gray-haired mob hitman 'Mike' in the 1968 film Bullitt...
and stunt driver Bill Hickman
Bill Hickman
William "Bill" Hickman was a stunt driver/actor from the 1950s through to the late 1970s. Hickman played a major role in terms of development and execution in three of the greatest movie car chase sequences of all time....
), burst into the room and shoot both Inspector Stanton and Ross, seriously wounding them both.
Bullitt wants to investigate who shot the pair and find the Mafia boss who ordered the hit. Upset, Chalmers attempts to shift blame on to Bullitt and the San Francisco Police Department. Ross subsequently dies of his wounds. Bullitt suppresses news of the death, asking Doctor Willard (Georg Stanford Brown
Georg Stanford Brown
Georg Stanford Brown is an Afro-Cuban-American actor and director, perhaps best known as one of the stars of the ABC police television series The Rookies from 1972–76...
) to misplace the chart and have the body placed in the morgue
Morgue
A morgue or mortuary is used for the storage of human corpses awaiting identification, or removal for autopsy or disposal by burial, cremation or otherwise...
under a John Doe
John Doe
The name "John Doe" is used as a placeholder name in a legal action, case or discussion for a male party, whose true identity is unknown or must be withheld for legal reasons. The name is also used to refer to a male corpse or hospital patient whose identity is unknown...
identity.
Chalmers arrives at the hospital on Sunday morning and is angered that Ross has disappeared. He is further incensed when he and his police minion Captain Baker (Norman Fell
Norman Fell
Norman Fell , born Norman Noah Feld, was an American actor of film and television, most famous for his role as landlord Mr. Roper on the sitcom Three's Company and its spin-off, The Ropers.-Early life:...
) receive no help from Bullitt. Chalmers places pressure on Bullitt to produce Ross, to no effect.
Bullitt reconstructs Ross's movements, finding his way to a hotel where he finds a woman registered under the name Dorothy Simmons (Brandy Carroll). With the hearing the next day, Bullitt suspects the dead mobster may not be who he seems. After picking up his Ford Mustang
Ford Mustang
The Ford Mustang is an automobile manufactured by the Ford Motor Company. It was initially based on the second generation North American Ford Falcon, a compact car. Introduced early on April 17, 1964, as a "1964½" model, the 1965 Mustang was the automaker's most successful launch since the Model A...
, Bullitt is tailed by the two hitmen, resulting in a famous car chase that ultimately kills the hitmen.
Back at the police station, Bullitt is interrogated, and is given until Monday morning to follow his remaining lead. He begins to investigate Simmons, but discovers that she has been murdered. Later, Bullitt and Delgetti learn that Simmons's true identity was Dorothy Rennick, and that the murdered man that they knew as Ross may in fact be her husband, Albert, a car salesman with no police record. Bullitt requests a copy of Rennick's passport, hoping to prove this theory.
Chalmers arrives at the morgue, demanding, from Bullitt, a signed admission that Ross died while in his custody. Bullitt demurs, and when the faxed copy of the Rennicks' passport photos arrives, Chalmers is shown to have sent the police to protect the wrong man. The real Ross set Rennick up in order to escape, then killed Rennick's wife to silence her. Chalmers later tries to smooth things over by offering Bullitt a chance to further his career, which Bullitt refuses.
Bullitt's partner discovers that the Rennicks have tickets to fly to Rome that night. They go to the airport, where Bullitt discovers the real Johnny Ross (Pat Renella) and pursues him. A chase across the working runways of San Francisco Airport ensues, with Bullitt eventually shooting and killing Ross after chasing him back into the terminal.
Cast
- Steve McQueenSteve McQueenTerrence Steven "Steve" McQueen was an American movie actor. He was nicknamed "The King of Cool." His "anti-hero" persona, which he developed at the height of the Vietnam counterculture, made him one of the top box-office draws of the 1960s and 1970s. McQueen received an Academy Award nomination...
as Bullitt - Jacqueline BissetJacqueline BissetJacqueline Bisset is an English actress. She has been nominated for four Golden Globe Awards and an Emmy Award. She is known for her roles in the films Bullitt , Airport , The Deep , Class , and the TV series Nip/Tuck in 2006...
as Cathy - Robert VaughnRobert VaughnRobert Francis Vaughn, , is an American actor noted for stage, film and television work. His best known roles include the suave spy Napoleon Solo in the 1960s television series The Man from U.N.C.L.E., wealthy detective Harry Rule in the 1970s television series The Protectors, Albert Stroller in...
as Chalmers - Don GordonDon GordonDon Gordon is an American film and television actor. He is sometimes billed as Donald Gordon.Gordon was born in Los Angeles, California, as Donald Walter Guadagno. His most notable films were where he appeared alongside his friend Steve McQueen in Bullitt, Papillon and The Towering Inferno...
as Delgetti - Simon OaklandSimon OaklandSimon Oakland was an American actor of stage, screen, and television.-Early life and career:Oakland was born in Brooklyn, New York City. He began his performing arts career as a musician . He began his acting career in the late 1940s...
as Captain Bennet - Norman FellNorman FellNorman Fell , born Norman Noah Feld, was an American actor of film and television, most famous for his role as landlord Mr. Roper on the sitcom Three's Company and its spin-off, The Ropers.-Early life:...
as Baker - Robert DuvallRobert DuvallRobert Selden Duvall is an American actor and director. He has won an Academy Award, two Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards and a BAFTA over the course of his career....
as Weissberg (taxi driver)
- Georg Stanford BrownGeorg Stanford BrownGeorg Stanford Brown is an Afro-Cuban-American actor and director, perhaps best known as one of the stars of the ABC police television series The Rookies from 1972–76...
as Dr. Willard - Justin Tarr as Eddy
- Carl ReindelCarl ReindelCarl Warren Reindel was an American actor, best known for portraying Lieutenant Kenneth M. Taylor in the epic war film Tora! Tora! Tora!. Reindel also played "Stanton" in Steve McQueen's hit film Bullitt and "Lt. Comroe" in classic science fiction film The Andromeda Strain...
as Carl Stanton - Felice Orlandi as Renick
- Vic TaybackVic TaybackVictor "Vic" Tayback was an American actor.-Life and career:Tayback was born in Brooklyn, New York City, New York, the son of Helen and Najeeb James Tayback. His parents were immigrants from Aleppo, Syria. Tayback moved with his family to Burbank, California, during his teenage years and attended...
as Pete Ross - Robert Lipton as 1st Aide
- Ed PeckEd PeckEd Peck was an American actor.Peck was born in New York, United States, and was active in television and in films from 1951 to 1983....
as Westcott - Pat Renella as John Ross
- Paul GengePaul GengePaul Morgan Genge was an actor from the 1950s through to the late 1970s. Genge is most famous for his role as the shotgun toting gray-haired mob hitman 'Mike' in the 1968 film Bullitt...
as Mike - John ApreaJohn ApreaJohn Aprea is an American actor, known for his role as "Young Sal Tessio" in The Godfather: Part II and on television as "Lucas Castigliano" on the soap opera Another World, from 1989 to 1992. As of 2006, he is currently filming a new soap opera in Southern California called, "The Heiress", which...
as Killer - Al Checco as Desk Clerk
- Bill HickmanBill HickmanWilliam "Bill" Hickman was a stunt driver/actor from the 1950s through to the late 1970s. Hickman played a major role in terms of development and execution in three of the greatest movie car chase sequences of all time....
as Phil
Car chase
Leonard Maltin
Leonard Maltin is an American film and animated film critic and historian, author of several mainstream books on cinema, focusing on nostalgic, celebratory narratives.-Personal life:...
has called it a "now-classic car chase, one of the screen's all-time best." Emanuel Levy
Emanuel Levy
Emanuel Levy is an American film critic and professor.-Life:Emanuel Levy began his studies at Tel Aviv University, where he received B.A. in sociology, anthropology and political science. He did graduate work in sociology, film, and culture studies at Columbia University, where he earned a Ph.D...
wrote in 2003 that, "Bullitt contains one of the most exciting car chases in film history, a sequence that revolutionized Hollywood's standards." In his obituary for Peter Yates, Bruce Weber wrote "Mr. Yates’s reputation probably rests most securely on “Bullitt” (1968), his first American film — and indeed, on one particular scene, an extended car chase that instantly became a classic." The editing of this scene likely won editor Frank P. Keller
Frank P. Keller
Frank P. Keller was an American film and television editor with 24 feature film credits from 1958 - 1977...
the Academy Award for Best Editing.
Later, producer Philip D'Antoni
Philip D'Antoni
-Work:D'Antoni won an Academy Award in 1971 for the Best Picture, for The French Connection. He also won a Golden Globe award in 1972 for the Best Motion Picture Drama for The French Connection. He began his career on TV with the glamorous productions, "Sophia Loren in Rome," "Elizabeth Taylor in...
filmed two more car chases for The French Connection
The French Connection (film)
This article is about the 1971 film. For the British fashion label, see French Connection .The French Connection is a 1971 American crime film directed by William Friedkin. The film was adapted and fictionalized by Ernest Tidyman from the non-fiction book by Robin Moore...
and The Seven-Ups
The Seven-Ups
The Seven-Ups is a 1973 American film released by 20th Century Fox. It stars Roy Scheider as a renegade policeman who is the leader of The Seven-Ups, a police team who uses dirty, unorthodox tactics to snare their quarry on charges leading to prison sentences of seven years or more upon...
, both set and filmed in New York City.
Filming
The total time of the scene is 10 minutes and 53 seconds, and it began in the Fisherman's Wharf area (at Columbus and Chestnut), followed by Midtown shooting on Hyde Street and Laguna Street, with shots of Coit TowerCoit Tower
Coit Tower is a tower in the Telegraph Hill neighborhood of San Francisco, California. The tower, in the city's Pioneer Park, was built in 1933 at the request of Lillie Hitchcock Coit to beautify the city of San Francisco; Coit bequeathed one-third of her estate to the city "to be expended in an...
and locations around and on Filbert and University Streets. The scene ends at the Guadalupe Canyon Parkway in Brisbane, out of the city.
Two 1968 390 CID V8 Ford Mustang
Ford Mustang
The Ford Mustang is an automobile manufactured by the Ford Motor Company. It was initially based on the second generation North American Ford Falcon, a compact car. Introduced early on April 17, 1964, as a "1964½" model, the 1965 Mustang was the automaker's most successful launch since the Model A...
s (325 bhp) with four-speed manual transmission were used for the chase scene, both owned by Ford Motor Company and part of a promotional loan agreement with Warner Bros. The Mustangs' engines, brakes and suspensions were heavily modified for the chase by veteran car racer Max Balchowsky. Ford Motor Company had also originally loaned two Ford Galaxie
Ford Galaxie
The Ford Galaxie was a full-size car built in the United States by the Ford Motor Company for model years 1959 through 1974. The name was used for the top models in Ford’s full-size range from 1959 until 1961, in a marketing attempt to appeal to the excitement surrounding the Space Race...
sedans that were intended to be used in the chase scenes, but the producers found the cars entirely too heavy to put through jumps over the hills of San Francisco without the cars' suspensions being severely damaged. The Galaxie sedans were replaced with two 1968 440 CID/375 bhp Dodge Charger
Dodge Charger
The Dodge Charger is an American automobile manufactured by the Dodge division of Chrysler. There have been several different Dodge vehicles, built on three different platforms and sizes, all bearing the Charger nameplate...
s (three-speed automatic transmission) that were bought outright from Glendale Dodge in Glendale, California
Glendale, California
Glendale is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. As of the 2010 Census, the city population is 191,719, down from 194,973 at the 2000 census. making it the third largest city in Los Angeles County and the 22nd largest city in the state of California...
. The engines in both Chargers were left largely unmodified, but the suspension was mildly upgraded to cope with the demands of the stunt work.
The director called for speeds of about 75–80 mph (33.5–35.8 ), but the cars (including the ones containing the cameras) reached speeds of over 110 miles per hour (49.2 m/s) on surface streets. Driver's point-of-view angles were used to give the audience the "feel" of the ride as the cars jumped the hills. Filming the chase scene took three weeks, resulting in 9 minutes and 42 seconds of film. During this film sequence, the Charger loses five wheel covers and has different ones missing in different shots. As a result of shooting from multiple angles simultaneously, and some angles' footage used at different times to give the illusion of different streets, the speeding cars can be seen passing the same green Volkswagen Beetle
Volkswagen Beetle
The Volkswagen Type 1, widely known as the Volkswagen Beetle or Volkswagen Bug, is an economy car produced by the German auto maker Volkswagen from 1938 until 2003...
four different times, and the same blue Chevelle Malibu S.S.396 with a black vinyl top three times. The Charger also crashes into the camera in one scene and the damaged front fender is noticeable in later scenes. After the Charger hits a parked car, it disappears for a split second from the screen before the scene is changed. The San Francisco authorities did not let the filmmakers film the car chase on the Golden Gate Bridge, but they did permit the passage to be filmed in Midtown locations including the Mission District, and in neighboring Brisbane, on the city's outskirts.
McQueen, an accomplished driver, drove in the close-up
Close-up
In filmmaking, television production, still photography and the comic strip medium a close-up tightly frames a person or an object. Close-ups are one of the standard shots used regularly with medium shots and long shots . Close-ups display the most detail, but they do not include the broader scene...
scenes, about 10% of the chase in the film. The stunt coordinator, Carey Loftin
Carey Loftin
Carey Loftin was an American actor and stuntman. One of his most famous roles was as the truck driver in Steven Spielberg's Duel, although his face was never seen...
, hired stuntman
Stunt double
A stunt double is a type of body double, specifically a skilled replacement used for dangerous film or video sequences, in movies and television , and for other sophisticated stunts...
and motorcycle racer Bud Ekins
Bud Ekins
Bud Ekins was one of the foremost stuntmen of his generation. Born James Sherwin Ekins in Hollywood, California, he is known to most as the actor who jumped the fence on a disguised Triumph TR6 Trophy 650cc motorcycle in The Great Escape, and who drove the Ford Mustang 390 GT in Bullitt...
, and McQueen's usual stunt driver Loren Janes, to do the dangerous stunts in the Mustang. Ekins is also the stunt man who lays down his bike in front of a skidding truck during the chase (Ekins also doubled for McQueen in the sequence of The Great Escape
The Great Escape (film)
The Great Escape is a 1963 American film about an escape by Allied prisoners of war from a German POW camp during World War II, starring Steve McQueen, James Garner, and Richard Attenborough...
in which McQueen's character jumps over a barbed wire fence on a motorcycle). The Mustang’s interior rear view mirror goes up and down depending on who is driving; when the mirror is up (visible) McQueen is behind the wheel, and when it is down (not visible) Ekins is driving. The black Dodge Charger was driven by Bill Hickman
Bill Hickman
William "Bill" Hickman was a stunt driver/actor from the 1950s through to the late 1970s. Hickman played a major role in terms of development and execution in three of the greatest movie car chase sequences of all time....
, who also played one of the hitmen and helped with the choreography of the chase scene. The other hitman was played by Paul Genge
Paul Genge
Paul Morgan Genge was an actor from the 1950s through to the late 1970s. Genge is most famous for his role as the shotgun toting gray-haired mob hitman 'Mike' in the 1968 film Bullitt...
who had played another character who rode a Dodge off the road to his death in an episode of Perry Mason
Perry Mason (TV series)
Perry Mason is an American legal drama produced by Paisano Productions that ran from September 1957 to May 1966 on CBS. The title character, portrayed by Raymond Burr, is a fictional Los Angeles defense attorney who originally appeared in detective fiction by Erle Stanley Gardner...
- "The Case of the Sausalito Sunrise" two years earlier.
Of the two Mustangs, one was scrapped after filming due to liability concerns and the surviving backup car was sold to an employee of Warner Brothers' editing department. The car changed hands several times, and Steve McQueen at one point made an unsuccessful attempt to buy it. The Mustang is rumored to have been kept in a barn in the Ohio River Valley by an unknown owner.
Editing
The editing of the car chase by Frank P. KellerFrank P. Keller
Frank P. Keller was an American film and television editor with 24 feature film credits from 1958 - 1977...
likely won Keller the editing Oscar for 1968, and has been included in lists of the "Best Editing Sequences of All-Time". Paul Monaco has written, "The most compelling street footage of 1968, however, appeared in an entirely contrived sequence, with nary a hint of documentary feel about it -- the car chase through the streets of San Francisco in Bullitt, created from footage shot over nearly five weeks. Billy Fraker, the cinematographer for the film, attributed the success of the chase sequence primarily to the work of the editor, Frank P. Keller. At the time, Keller was credited with cutting the piece in such a superb manner that he made the city of San Francisco a "character" in the film." The editing of the scene was not without difficulties; Ralph Rosenblum wrote in 1979 that "those who care about such things may know that during the filming of the climactic chase scene in Bullitt, an out-of-control car filled with dummies tripped a wire which prematurely sent a costly set up in flames, and that editor Frank Keller salvaged the near-catastrophe with a clever and unusual juxtaposition of images that made the explosion appear to go off on time." This chase scene has also been cited by critics as groundbreaking in its realism and originality.
Critical reception
Bullitt was well received by critics and is considered by some as one of the best films of 1968. Renata AdlerRenata Adler
Renata Adler is an American author, journalist and film critic.-Background and education:Adler was born in Milan, Italy, and grew up in Danbury, Connecticut. After gaining a B.A. in philosophy and German from Bryn Mawr, Adler studied for an M.A. in Comparative Literature at Harvard under I. A...
made the film a NYT Critics Pick, saying its a "terrific movie, just right for Steve McQueen—fast, well acted, written the way people talk"; accord to Adler, "the ending should satisfy fans from Dragnet
Dragnet (series)
Dragnet is a radio and television crime drama about the cases of a dedicated Los Angeles police detective, Sergeant Joe Friday, and his partners...
to Camus
Albert Camus
Albert Camus was a French author, journalist, and key philosopher of the 20th century. In 1949, Camus founded the Group for International Liaisons within the Revolutionary Union Movement, which was opposed to some tendencies of the Surrealist movement of André Breton.Camus was awarded the 1957...
."
Among 21st century critics, it holds a 97% "fresh"rating on Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
, representing positive reviews from 32 of 33 critics as of October 2011. In 2004, The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
placed the film on its list of The Best 1000 Movies Ever Made. In 2011, Time magazine listed it among the "The 15 Greatest Movie Car Chases of All Time", describing it as "the one, the first, the granddaddy, the chase on the top of almost every list", and saying "Bullitt‘s car chase is a reminder that every great such scene is a triumph of editing as much as it is stuntwork. Naturally, it won that year’s Academy Award for Best Editing."
Awards and honors
The film was nominated and won several critical awards. Frank P. Keller won the Academy Award for Best Film Editing. The film was also nominated for Best Sound. Bullitt was also nominated for several BAFTA Film AwardsBritish Academy Film Awards
The British Academy Film Awards are presented in an annual award show hosted by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts . It is the British counterpart of the Oscars. As of 2008, it has taken place in the Royal Opera House, having taken over from the flagship Odeon cinema on Leicester Square...
, including Best Director
BAFTA Award for Best Direction
Winners of the BAFTA Award for Best Direction presented by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts.-2010s:* 2010 - David Fincher – The Social Network** Tom Hooper – The King's Speech** Danny Boyle – 127 Hours...
for Peter Yates, Best Supporting Actor
BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role
Best Actor in a Supporting Role is a British Academy Film award presented annually by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding supporting performance in a film...
for Robert Vaughn, Best Cinematography
BAFTA Award for Best Cinematography
-Best Cinematography - Colour:* 1963 - From Russia with Love - Ted Moore** Nine Hours to Rama – Arthur Ibbetson** The Running Man – Robert Krasker** Sammy Going South – Erwin Hillier** The Scarlet Blade – Jack Asher...
for William A. Fraker
William A. Fraker
William Ashman Fraker, A.S.C., B.S.C. was a cinematographer, film director, and producer. He has been nominated five times for the Academy Award for Best Cinematography. In 2000, he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Society of Cinematographers honoring his career...
, Best Film Editing
BAFTA Award for Best Editing
The BAFTA Award for Best Editing is one of several annual awards presented by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts . The film-voting members of the Academy select the five nominated films in each category; only the principal editor for each film are named, which excludes additional...
for Frank P. Keller, and Best Sound Track
BAFTA Award for Best Sound
The British Academy of Film and Television Arts Award for Best Sound has been presented to its winners since 1968 and sound designers of all nationalities are eligible to receive the award.-Winners 1968-present:...
. Keller also won the American Cinema Editors Eddie Award for Best Edited Feature Film. The film was awarded the National Society of Film Critics Award
National Society of Film Critics
The National Society of Film Critics is an American film critic organization. As of December 2007 the NSFC had approximately 60 members who wrote for a variety of weekly and daily newspapers.-History:...
for Best Cinematography (William A. Fraker) and the Golden Reel Award
Motion Picture Sound Editors
Founded in 1953, Motion Picture Sound Editors is an honorary society of motion picture sound editors. The society's goals are to educate others about and increase the recognition of the sound editors, show the artistic merit of the soundtracks, and improve the professional relationship of its...
for Best Sound Editing - Feature Film. The film was also successful at the 1970 Laurel Awards
Laurel Awards
The Laurel Awards were cinema awards to honor pictures, actors, actresses, directors and composers. This award was created by Motion Picture Exhibitor magazine, and ran from 1958 to 1968, then 1970 and 1971....
. It won 2nd place Golden Laurel awards for Best Action Drama, Best Action Performance (Steve McQueen) and Best Female New Face (Jacqueline Bisset). In 2000, the Society of Camera Operators
Society of Operating Cameramen
Founded in 1978 under the name Society of Operating Cameramen, the SOC was incorporated in 1981 in the state of California as a nonprofit organization. Its primary mission is to advance the art, craft and creative contribution of the camera operator in the motion picture and television industries...
awarded Bullitt its "Historical Shot" award to David M. Walsh. Alan Trustman and Harry Kleiner won that year's Edgar Award
Edgar Award
The Edgar Allan Poe Awards , named after Edgar Allan Poe, are presented every year by the Mystery Writers of America...
for Best Mystery Screenplay. In 2001, the American Film Institute
American Film Institute
The American Film Institute is an independent non-profit organization created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which was established in 1967 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act...
found Bullitt to be the #36 on its list of thrillers.
Legacy
The Ford Mustang name has been closely associated with the film. In 2001, the Ford Motor CompanyFord Motor Company
Ford Motor Company is an American multinational automaker based in Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit. The automaker was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. In addition to the Ford and Lincoln brands, Ford also owns a small stake in Mazda in Japan and Aston Martin in the UK...
released the Bullitt edition Ford Mustang GT Another version of the Ford Mustang Bullitt, which is closer to resembling the original film Mustang, was released in 2008.
Steve McQueen's likeness as Frank Bullitt was used in two Ford commercials. The first was for the Europe-only 2001 Ford Puma
Ford Puma
The Ford Puma was a small sports coupé produced by the Ford Motor Company from 1997 to 2001 http://www.parkers.co.uk/cars/owners-reviews/search.aspx?range=438#fuel=P&Body=Coupe&transmission=M, for sale in Europe...
, which featured McQueen driving the car around San Francisco before parking it in a studio apartment garage beside the film Mustang and the motorcycle from The Great Escape
The Great Escape (film)
The Great Escape is a 1963 American film about an escape by Allied prisoners of war from a German POW camp during World War II, starring Steve McQueen, James Garner, and Richard Attenborough...
. In a 2004 commercial for the 2005 Mustang, McQueen appears and drives the new Mustang after a man receives a Field of Dreams
Field of Dreams
Field of Dreams is a 1989 American fantasy-drama film directed by Phil Alden Robinson and is from the novel Shoeless Joe by W. P. Kinsella...
-style epiphany and constructs a racetrack in the middle of a cornfield.