Detroit's involvement in CARS
As anyone who reads Autoblog is aware by now, we’re pretty jazzed about Pixar’s upcoming June 9th release of CARS, which is shaping up to be a celebration of the auto on celluloid. A pair of recent Detroit News articles reveals just how large a part the domestic duo of Ford and GM has played in the movie’s making, in addition to our already reported on involvement of Porsche.
The film’s director, John Lasseter, has been a good friend of Ford’s design diva J Mays since 2000. The pair visited SEMA and attended the Pebble Beach Concours de Elegance together. Mays even visited Pixar’s studios in Emeryville, CA on more than one occasion to check on the film’s progress. The most prominent Ford in CARS ended up being a 1949 Mercury Police Cruiser – the town’s sheriff (pictured above).
Lasseter also visited General Motors and spent time with some of the General’s designers. The director was one of the very first people to view the redesigned C6 Corvette, in fact. CARS features a few cars from GM including a ’59 Impala lowrider named Ramone, a ’75 Cadillac Coupe de Ville named Tex and an unnamed green HUMMER.
J Mays and the Blue Oval’s current head of things that go fast, Hau Thai-Tang, were among a group of 700 who viewed an early screening of the movie at Pixar’s studios last weekend.
[Source: Detroit News]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Paul Roides 7:27PM (4/18/2006)
Ferrari's involvement has as of yet remained unmentioned, yet some of the film's characters are seen waving Ferrari flags and sporting ferrari caps in the trailer.
Any official word on their involvement?
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Bob-o 7:50PM (4/18/2006)
Porsche's pretty involved too. I wonder how those two will mesh...
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Udayan Tripathi 8:16PM (4/18/2006)
Ferrari is involved? The character I remember most from the trailers is the old rattly pickup truck with a southern accent. He's cool.
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Beau 11:23PM (4/18/2006)
None of the cars in the movie are Ferraris. Two of them are Ferrari race fans.
I take that back. There is a F430 at the end.
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Mal Fuller 11:53PM (4/18/2006)
The real star of this movie is Doc Hudson, a 1951 Hudson Hornet. Hudsons were built in Detroit for decades beginning in 1909. The Hudson factory was on Jefferson Avenue. Paul Newman is the voice of Doc Hudson. This is the first time Paul has done a voice in an animated movie!
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Ken 2:09AM (4/19/2006)
At first, I thought the movie would be awful (I thought it was 100% NASCAR, and would mean it would suck to me).
However, after seeing the trailer and stuff like this, I am looking forward to it!
Maybe Pixar isn't deal.
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Richard Warren 6:17PM (4/19/2006)
The trailers look pretty good, I think it'll be a fun ride.
Mal, yep, the old Hudsons were one heck of a car
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