Movie Trivia

[Graham]

In 'Psycho' (the original version, not the rubbish remakes) Janet Leigh changes her car at a used-car lot as she scarpers with the money she stole off her employer. Does anyone know (a) the make of car she originally drove and (b) the make of car she exchanged it for?

I desperately need to know.......

Graham

[sdreid]

Hey Graham:

I think both were Fords as I believe was the police car so I wonder about product placement. The car she traded for (with "Old California Charlie") was a 57? Ford and the car she traded in was something close to a 55 Ford as best I can recall.

[Graham]

Stan,

if this is so, then I eat worms for breakfast tomorrow. I'm no expert on 1950's American cars, but for reasons unknown I always thought that the one she traded in was a Mercury, but what the hell? The car she drove away from Charley's place was one nice-looking ve-hickle.

Thanks,

Graham

[sdreid]

Graham-I will not say for sure that it was not a Mercury. Both were Ford products and probably resembled each other so don't put your worm bib on until you know for sure.

[RivkahChaya]

The one that sinks in the swamp is a '57 Ford Galaxie. I think the earlier car is a Ford Fairlane, but I'm not sure the year. Let me Google up an image.

[RivkahChaya]

Car 2 (4-door version):



57 Galaxie (2-door):

[sdreid]

I googled and one source says that the car she traded in (car #1) was a 54 Ford.

[RivkahChaya]

By the way, for people who have never driven an old car, say, old enough to have a carburetor, old cars had windshield wiper motors that ran off a vacuum from the carburetor. Even when the were in perfect condition, they were sluggish-- they slowed down any time you went up a hill, or pulled out of a stoplight, and if the tube that went from the carburetor had a leak, they worked really badly. They had two speeds if you had a nice car. Some models had just one speed. Also, the wipers didn't hug the windshield like they do now, so they slapped and splashed, and windshields had a lot more glare.

Not to mention, the tires were different. They were probably bias tires. Steel belted radials existed, but they just weren't in common use, and bias tires gave you a bumpy ride, and made you slide all over the place in the rain.

Then there was the fact that anti-skid, anti-lock brakes also hadn't been invented.

It's also possible that car didn't have a seat belt, I don't know.

It's hard to appreciate how harrowing a nighttime trip in pouring rain was in 1960 (actually, 1959), if you've never driven a car from that era. I had a 1961 Ford Falcon, which I drove in the 90s. It had modern tires, and modern shocks, and seat belts that I installed myself, and it wasn't my only car, so I didn't drive it in really bad weather conditions. It got vapor lock sometimes, but it was a lot of fun. I sold it after I had a kid, and wouldn't be able to work on it anymore.

[RivkahChaya]

I googled and one source says that the car she traded in (car #1) was a 54 Ford.

I'm having trouble finding an image of it. I don't have a file of the movie, but I have a DVD. I'll try to grab an image later, and then match it up to a model and year. I remember it was black.

[RivkahChaya]

Hmmm. The 54 Fairlaines were pretty long. Ford made a smaller car in 54 called a "Crestline." It had the round-top look that seems familiar, sort of still almost 1940s-ish about the first car. I remember it was a pretty modest car. Marion pays a $700 difference, which is a lot of money. You could buy an entire car for $700 in 1959, and I don't mean a clunker with a bad muffler and iffy brakes. Heck, I bought a not halfish bad car in 2001 for $1200. Anyway, a new Galaxie in 1959 cost about $3,000. In 1954, a Crestline cost about $2,100,

I mean, part of the point is that the dealer has asked for a lot of money expecting Marion to haggle him down, and he doesn't, which is why he is suddenly suspicious, but she also does get a car that is both newer, and a better model.

[RivkahChaya]

I'm having trouble getting a good image of the grill on Marion's first car, but if the above poster is correct that it's a 1954 car, then it has to be a 1954 Fairlane (which I think I misspelled above; typo, sorry "Fairlane" is correct). The contour over the rear tires doesn't match the 54 Crestline. Galaxie is still a step up from a Fairlane, but not quite as from a Crestline.

It's also possible it wasn't a real car. They may have shown the grill of one car, and the rear of another, and the interior of a third. Sometimes directors do that if they can't find a car that lets them film well from all angles. You know, if the car that has the best interior for camera mounting has a split windshield, and big tailfins, so it's not good for filming from the outside, or it has a really unusual, or large grill that causes flares. They might change the grill, making the car hard to identify, or use two different cars, one for the rear shots, and one for the front shots.

I don't think that's the case, though. I have the book Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho, and while it does not mention the exact models of the cars, it goes into details about all the special trickery, so if Hitchcock had used a composite car, I think that would have been mentioned.

Ford was the sponsor of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, which is why the cars were both Fords in the first place-- they were probably donated, and Ford would probably want them to be recognizable. It's probably also the reason that Marion doesn't have any mechanical trouble to add to her woes.