There is a lot of controversy about what happened to the five white 1970 Dodge Challengers from the movie, the Vanishing Point. Four of the cars were 440ci 4-speed manual cars, and one was a 383ci automatic transmission car. According to the video, a reliable source was present at a salvage auction in Los Angelos, California in 1971 that said those five cars were actually sold for scrap. If one of these cars did happen to survive, there would be no way to actually know it was one of these cars as documentation about them being movie cars doesn’t exist. The only way to experience one of these screen-used cars from Vanishing Point is to check out the clone made for the 1996 tv remake, which is exactly what this car is we see in the video.
The second Vanishing Point movie was made for tv, it was never intended to be a big screen movie. A cult following has developed over the years for the brands, although the second movie isn’t exactly as popular, and some of them don’t like the remake at all. Regardless of how you feel about the storyline or actors, the movie was all about the car, as any good car movie should be.
As with the first movie, the second movie used five cars. One of them was picked up and restored, and the others were left as they were, dirty. The other cars, some used as stunt cars, were left with all the road grime on them, which consisted of potting soil and coffee sprayed on the car, and then sprayed with hairspray to keep it in place. The restored car was the main car, or the ‘hero’ car used mostly for close-ups and beauty shots.
The only reason these cars were able to be retained is because they were owned by production, as opposed to the first set of Vanishing Point cars, which were loaned for the movie. Back then, no one really cared about keeping movie cars around after filming. Thankfully, all of these cars were bought together by Ted Stephens, some in parts, but they still exist in some capacity, and the car in this video is the best example left.
Shawn Henry is a Texas native who has spent the majority of his career building and selling F-Bodies and Corvettes. Now studying journalism, he is taking a new direction with his love of performance vehicles.
