"Gone in 60 Seconds" is easily one of the great car chase movies, and it works almost in spite of its inherent "rough" quality. The acting here is pretty low-rent, and the pacing (for the first half, that is) is probably on the sedate side for the modern audience. Me, I was in candyland with one shot after another of '70s muscle cars, not to mention the array of foreign sports (Panteras don't grow on trees). And the movie is distinctly of its time and place. Verrry '70s. Who can hate that? And there are several shots of panicked pedestrians during the final chase - and according to the trivia section, those weren't stunt people. Guerilla filmmaking, baby!
But then we get to the second half, which is all car chase. Forty god-loving minutes of car chase. So much wanton destruction, it borders on demolition derby. And it's not the modern cut-to-ribbons in the editing room, noisy, dizzying bonanza - it's a genuine let-it-build series of near-misses, clipped-fenders and t-bones that actually thrills and builds to a pretty cool jump. And that's not even the cool payoff that is the slick getaway in the final moments.
You can fault this movie for its pedestrian first half, but I can't think of any reason to hate the second. And even if you bought the film and just skipped to the car chase, "Gone in 60 Seconds" still earns its place.
7/10
But then we get to the second half, which is all car chase. Forty god-loving minutes of car chase. So much wanton destruction, it borders on demolition derby. And it's not the modern cut-to-ribbons in the editing room, noisy, dizzying bonanza - it's a genuine let-it-build series of near-misses, clipped-fenders and t-bones that actually thrills and builds to a pretty cool jump. And that's not even the cool payoff that is the slick getaway in the final moments.
You can fault this movie for its pedestrian first half, but I can't think of any reason to hate the second. And even if you bought the film and just skipped to the car chase, "Gone in 60 Seconds" still earns its place.
7/10