Driving Through Paris in a Ferrari Going REEEEALLY FAST
A friend of mine sent me a YouTube video which is truly incredible.
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I have been to Paris about fifteen times…maybe twenty. I’ve kind of lost track. Most of my travel through Paris has been on foot or by French Taxi, but five or six times I drove my own car there. The first time I drove my own car in Paris was in 1973 when I was living in Frankfurt, and the last time was in 2006 when I lived in the Netherlands. I've seen these sights in Paris many times, but never at this speed.
On an August morning in 1978, the French filmmaker Claude Lelouch mounted a gyro-stabilized camera to the bumper of a Ferrari 275 GTB and had a friend, a professional Formula 1 driver, go through the heart of Paris early in the morning really, really fast.
On an August morning in 1978, the French filmmaker Claude Lelouch mounted a gyro-stabilized camera to the bumper of a Ferrari 275 GTB and had a friend, a professional Formula 1 driver, go through the heart of Paris early in the morning really, really fast.
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For technical reasons the film was limited to ten minutes. The course driven was from Porte Dauphine, then southeast on the Avenue des Champs-Élysées past the Arc de Triomphe and the Louvre museum, then turning north and finally ending up at the Sacré-Cœur Basilica up on the Butte in Montmartre, which is the highest point in Paris.
No streets were closed because Lelouch was unable to obtain a permit.
The driver completed the course in about 9 minutes, reaching nearly 140 mph (225 km/hr) in some stretches. The footage shows him running lots of red lights, nearly hitting real pedestrians, and driving the wrong way up one-way streets.
Upon showing the film in public for the first time, Lelouch was arrested. He has never revealed the identity of the driver, and the film went underground. If you haven't seen this before you will enjoy it. It is a classic.
LINK: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqHrCLt3Geo
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NOTE: Recent claims by the director himself suggest that he may have driven his own Mercedes 450SEL in the film and afterwards dubbed in the sound effects of a Ferrari 275GTB. Or even that he may have been travelling MUCH slower and just speeded up the playback. There is a bit of controversy surrounding this, but to me it really doesn't matter. The kind of car that was used is almost irrelevant, and for certain this guy was going way too fast for safety. What a masterful piece of driving. It was risky, selfish, and egotistical luncacy for sure. The person who was was driving showed callous disregard for the safety of others around him which is unforgivable. But anyone who has actually driven the streets of Paris knows that this was a once-in-a-lifetime, totally amazing ride. Breathtaking and awesome, FOR SURE!
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