Bored now by Bullitt? Done with Drive? Fed up with The French Connection? As Jason Bourne screeches his way into a cineplex near you from Wednesday, Harry Guerin puts his pedal to the metal and selects some car chases that deserve to rev more engines.
Gone in Sixty Seconds (1974)
Forget the Nicolas Cage and Angelina Jolie reheat - live the magic of the original. Writer, director, producer, stuntman and star HB Halicki plays the insurance investigator-turned-car thief who must steal 48 motors for a drug lord. Over 93 cars are wrecked in a 40-minute chase, and the Ford Mustang gets a starring credit!
The Seven-Ups (1973)
This unofficial follow-up to The French Connection has one of the best car chases that you've probably never seen, as ...Connection and Bullitt driver Bill Hickman and fellow stuntman Jerry Summers do battle in New York. The late, great actor Roy Scheider even did some of the driving but left the rest to the experts.
Ronin (1998)
The late John Frankenheimer was a director who loved cars and France, and he was able to combine both in this brilliant 1998 thriller. Robert De Niro leads a group of guns-for-hire in the hunt for a silver briefcase - one of the greatest McGuffins in movie history.
Duel (1971)
Steven Spielberg's first film, a TV movie, stars Dennis Weaver as a salesman relentlessly pursued by a tanker truck in the California desert. The car is a Plymouth Valiant, and it takes as much punishment as Weaver. The tension is unbearable throughout and even at just 24-years-old, Spielberg's genius is obvious.
The Driver (1978)
Ryan O'Neal is the wheel man; Bruce Dern is the detective with a grudge. There are less than 400 words in the film - director Walter Hill lets the cars do a lot of the talking. O'Neal's totalling of a Mercedes in a car-park never loses its wow factor, and boy does his character look cool in a shirt and jacket.
To Live and Die in LA (1985)
After giving us one the greatest car chases in movie history with The French Connection in the 1970s, director William Friedkin did it again in the 1980s. And just how do you try to outdo The French Connection? You have a chase up an LA freeway - the wrong way up an LA freeway.
Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981)
The Australian outback is the setting for all manner of automotive anarchy. Mel Gibson plays the post-apocalyptic drifter who comes to the rescue of a besieged community. Gibson never played a cooler character, and there are plenty of oddballs, chop-shop specials and action sequences to savour too.
Dirty Mary Crazy Larry (1974)
After a robbery, NASCAR wannabe Larry (Peter Fonda) and mechanic Deke (Adam Roarke) drive it like they stole it, with good-time girl Mary (Susan George) along for the ride and the sheriff (Vic Morrow) not far behind. Great antics and one of the most shocking endings in B-movie history.
Hooper (1978)
If you had a VCR in the early '80s, chances are this film was in it at some stage. 'Tache icon Burt Reynolds is the stuntman schooling protégé Jan Michael Vincent in the way of broken bones. The finale involves a Trans Am jumping a gorge.
Two-Lane Blacktop (1971)
This road movie captures Route 66 before the arrival of the Interstate. Musicians James Taylor and Dennis Wilson play two drifters in a '55 Chevy racing Warren Oates' Pontiac GTO from Arizona to Washington DC. So good you'll want to make the same trip.
