Import Tuners 101. The first Indy 500 was in 1911. In the 1920s and 30s, bootleggers were souping up Model Ts, and later Ford V8s, to evade Federal liquor agents, a cat-and-mouse affair which developed into NASCAR. In 1948, Hot Rod magazine was launched and NHRA established. In 1964, Pontiac introduced the GTO, and soon thereafter Ford brought out the Mustang. Despite this, the import tuner scene which started in California in the 1990s acts as though they invented this whole concept of modifying cars.
Historically, the preferred vehicles for performance modification were the Model T, the Ford V8, the ’55-57 Chevy, the Ford Mustang, Chevrolet Camaro, Pontiac Firebird, the GM A-bodies and from Mopar, the Charger, Challenger, Barracuda, and Road Runner/GTX. Even AMC made the Javelin. These were rear wheel drive, V8 cars made in America, designed from the ground up for performance. The “hot rodder” concept was simply to take the largest displacement V8s which would usually only be available in the largest, full-size models, and stuff them in mid-size (or smaller) cars – the largest engine stuffed in the smallest car it would fit in. The GTO was the perfect example: the 389 V8 under the hood of the Tempest/Lemans.
In the 90s, someone discovered that Honda Civics and Acura Integras, plus a whole host of other Japanese cars, could also be modified. These were cars with 4 cylinder engines, designed for maximum reliability and fuel economy with zero thought of performance. Since these cars are giving up 4 cylinders to muscle cars, they are prohibitively expensive to modify for actual performance, i.e. nitrous oxide, superchargers or turbochargers, at least to bring them to the level where muscle cars start out, much less exceed the performance of any muscle car with similar modifications. Not only can V8s be modified this way, they have been modified this way for ages (see above), and with twice the cylinders and 3-4 times the displacement (e.g. 6.0L V8 in 2005-06 GTO, three times as large as a 2.0L I4 but with only twice as many cylinders), they respond far better to these modifications than the 4 cylinder sewing machines do.
Naturally, most import tuners can’t afford the $$$ for nitrous, turbo, etc., so they focused on such substantial mods as heavily tinted windows, triple blade windshield wipers, overpowered stereos with way too much bass, super low suspension, spoilers which looked like bizarre wings, tons of stripes and decals (e.g. “Type R” badges put on non-white Acura Integras), and coffee can mufflers. If we can’t actually be fast, let’s at least LOOK like it may be fast….when it’s not. Eventually, this scene earned recognition in a series of movies. To be fair, American muscle does get a heavy dose of attention and respect, so I can’t complain 2 much.
The Fast and the Furious (First). Main location: Los Angeles. Dominic Torreto (Vin Diesel) & Brian O’Connor (Paul Walker) are the two main characters. DT is a colorful and bad-ass, but somehow likeable and sympathetic, criminal who always has some sort of “operation” planned. O’Connor is an LAPD officer who goes deep (deep deep) undercover to infiltrate DT’s gang and bring him down. Almost all of the cars are implausibly modified imports, for which the usual “mod” is a surplus of nitrous oxide, ubiquitously referred as “Nozzzz” (NOS being the most popular aftermarket supplier). Although drag strips have been in L.A. since the late 40s – NHRA being specifically established to get drag racing off the streets and onto the strips – all the racing is on the street, with cops and other drivers conveniently absent. O’Connor manages to convince DT – but none of his henchmen – that he’s not a cop. Of course he is. The import tuner crowd is obnoxious, the races implausibly computer generated, and the dialogue is mostly macho bullshit. Jordana Brewster plays Dom’s younger sister Mia, who O’Connor falls for, and Michelle Rodriguez is Letty, Dom’s girlfriend.
2 Fast 2 Furious. Main location: Miami. O’Connor returns, but Dominic is MIA; Roman “Rome” Pearce (Tyrese Gibson) replaces him as the “crime partner”. Two classic American muscle cars surface: a 1969 Yenko Camaro (427 equipped), and a Dodge Hemi Challenger R/T – after beating the owners of the two muscle cars in a pink slips race, the muscle winds up being the ride for the remainder of the film. Eva Mendes provides the appropriate eye candy as undercover (!) Federal agent Monica Fuentes pretending to be the bad guy’s lover. It’s Miami, so the bad guy, Verone, is a drug dealer. O’Connor is offered the job of bringing him in, to wipe out his no-no (letting Dom go loose at the end of the first movie).
#3. Tokyo Drift. Main location: Tokyo, Japan. O’Connor is absent, Dom has a minor cameo at the end. The film is essentially Sean (Lucas Black) as a white guy in an Asian world – he miraculously learns Japanese almost immediately and goes to school amidst the Sailor Moon crowd, aside from Twinkie (Bow Wow) a cool black dude who acts as his guide to Japanese culture. He bumps ugly with Drift King, the nephew of a yakuza warlord; DK’s partner Han teaches him how to “drift” in various ugly import tuner cars. Finally Sean beats DK in a drift race at night driving his father’s 60s Mustang which had been (again) improbably modified with a Japanese engine and other parts for drifting.
Fast & Furious #4. Main location: California-Mexican border. Dominic and O’Connor meet again. They’re out to take down a Mexican drug lord named Braga, and have to drive through a mine tunnel under the border not once, but twice – a scene which ends up looking like Lando Calrissian’s escape from the 2nd Death Star in the Milennium Falcon in “Return of the Jedi”. Dominic’s Chevelle and Charger both feature here, plus O’Connor’s annoying rice rockets (Dominic to O’Connor: “Muscle beats imports…every time”). Braga’s #2 man, Fenix, drives a nasty green Gran Torino – and was responsible for killing Letty, so there is a personal element to Dom’s beef with Braga.
#5. Fast Five, Main location: Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The gang escapes down to Rio – with Agent Rock (Dwayne Johnson) hot on their tail. The finale looks like it winds up on the Rio-Niteroi bridge. After some drama and excitement – theft of various cars from a train the desert, which looks like far Northeast Brazil – the gang decides to rob $100 million from corrupt Brazilian businessman Reyes, who looks a lot like Dunga, the last coach of the Brazilian national soccer team. Remarkably, they persuade Federal agent Hobbs (Rock) to assist in the theft. “Rome” returns to the gang for this episode.
Here we have more shooting than driving, and excellent scenery (Cristo Redentor and the beaches of Rio, plus some favela footage) than street racing – for which the main cars are late model Dodge Chargers. To my knowledge, Rio has no street racing scene; gas has always been expensive, VW is the GM of Brazil, and none of the usual US muscle was ever imported to Brazil. But Rio does have beautiful beaches and favelas full of ruthless drug dealers, so the crime and beauty element of the series could effectively be showcased in this movie.
#6? If the ending credits of #5 are any indication, there is an excellent chance that #6 will take place in Berlin, Germany. None of the previous movies take place in Europe, and Han is seen driving to Berlin at the end of FF5. “Sprockets!”
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