"Italian Job" Miura really destroyed?

Real Miura, no engine when it went over the cliff. No idea if any of it survives today.

Back in 1969 they were still making them and after the trip down the hill it probably didn't have much value.

 

Don't know about the Miura but I read the Aston DB4 was an Aston body on a Lancia Flaminia chassis.

I will try and dig up the link.

 

The Italian Job is a great "carguy" movie. It lulls you in at the start with the song "On days like these" (sung by the immortal Matt Monro - one of the greatest singers ever) Then they destroy what is arguably the most beautiful exotic car ever made. When I first saw watched it I was slack-jawed....that they actually crashed a Miura! I still have a hard time watching it today....

 

Yeah, but at least they didn't use a 400GT -- that would have be a REAL shame.

;^D

Fred
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My recollection from magazine articles is as follows:

The red Miura in the driving sequence was a brand new customer car loaned by Lamborghini. The serial # wasn't disclosed (doubt the owner would have been that happy to find his/her "brand new" car had been blasted round the alps! Might have felt differently though once the car became such an icon with the films success) so no one knows which one it was.

The one tipped over the cliff was an engineless wreck, I think the story was that it was owned by a Shah or a Prince and they wrecked it and it was returned to the factory. You can see it's engineless as it goes over the cliff. The crew said they returned for filming the next day and no parts could be seen in the ravine.

The DB4 was a Lancia rebodied as a DB4 but only because when they pushed the actual DB4 off the edge, the charge for the explosion went off early so they couldn't use the shot so they hastily got a Lancia rebodied to reshoot it. You can see the bonnet hinges the wrong way when it flies open. So a real DB4 and a Lancia got trashed. I remember there being some speculation that the DB4 had been salvaged and rebuilt though.

The E type that got crushed by the digger did get rebuilt and was featured in a magazine article about a charity drive with several Mini Coopers into the alps.

Obviously 3 of the Minis got destroyed but I recall reading that they were standard Minis fitted with Cooper alloys and that the Coopers used for the driving sequences ended up in storage in the UK somewhere.

All of which leaves out the nicest car of them all - the Mafia Fiat Dino Coupe in black. I wonder what happened to that?

 

According to Peter Robinson in his 1998 Classic & Sportscar story, for more than a decade after the demise of the aforementioned Miura 'wreck', enthusiasts would return from a trip down the ravine with small bits of Miura for souvenirs!

 

Earlier this week I had a conversation about the movie with a Miura owner. This link was sent to me: The Italian Job.

Lamborghini Miura

The Miura was coup for the production team, it was the supercar of the time, and many still believe that it is still the best looking supercar ever made. The production team couldn't really justify the expense to buy a new Miura. Lamborghini helped out by selling the crew a full shell, which was promptly painted bright Orange and placed on an accident damaged Miura chassis that the production had also been lucky to get their hands on.

Beckerman's Miura was a classy sight to the first viewers of The Italian Job, but unfortunately it didn't get that much screen time. Destroyed in a tunnel by the mob's Caterpillar, it was unceremoniously pushed down the mountainside. You can just make out that the Miura's chassis has no engine in it as it plummets down the mountain. Special effects crew member, Ken Morris, remembered that they went to retrieve the Miura the next day, but it had disappeared. They looked everywhere for it, but they never found it. He concluded that someone must have seen them throw it down the mountain and launched a midnight expedition to retrieve it. I wonder if it is still around today?

 

The mystery endures.............................................................

 

Well, these seem to be conflicting accounts. One says it was there for the picking, the other it disappeared into thin air.

The mystery doe in fact seem to endure.

 

I dont read the posts as conflicting. The "small bits of Miura for souvenirs!" doesn't suggest that the main body was left there just the many peices that flew off it as it went down the hill.

-mick

 

Mick, in my mind what happened here was likely very simple - producer rolled up to Sant Agata, "have you got a damaged Miura we could buy cheap for a movie?", "sure, we have a scrapped one out back you can have". If you look closely the body was already warped/twisted when the bulldozer pushes it away. It would not surprise me if it was the remains of the prototype Miura which Bob Wallace reported was crashed and mangled. This is one which we will never know the answer to.

I agree with you, you can see the things completely exploding & disintegrating as it goes down the ravine.

Peter Robinson did a Miura story for Classic Cars in 1997, and a local hotel owner near the crash site reported people finding bits of Miura down the ravine for years.

 

One of the British magazines did an article about the making of the movie around the same time it came out. I have a pretty bad photocopy of it, but I cannot see what actual magazine and what date its from. I attaching the first page.
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So there were two different Miura used? Does anyone know the number of the one with the engine?

 

Sumlin posted a customers car which serial not disclosed loaned prior to delivery. Guess by colour scheme and year shouldn't be to hard to work it out

Que : Joe ? Any idea Joe from your vast historical archive?

 

Very clearly. The driving car was a P400, and it had a typical orange livery. Curiously though, it has white, or light grey seats. I guess we could cross-reference the Registro data, but, I don't trust Lamborghnini's notations of the period, especially of the interior colors!

 

The Italian Job (1/10) Movie CLIP - Lamborghini Destroyed (1969) HD
[ame]www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3s3OXOzoH4[/ame]

 

I recall seeing some kind of recent remake of the Italian Job scene with (multiple?) Miura - recorded at the exact same location - but I can no longer find the video. Anyone?

 

Do you mean the Kidston version?

Kidston - Our Italian Job

 

Yes, that's the one! Very nice, thanks

 

The Original Italian Job on TCM channel starting right now...

 

Looks like whatever remained washed away down river! Hardly surprising there wasn't much to find the next day...

 

Guys guys......Miura-schmiura.....
The real issue is: whatever became of the bus?
You know, the one with the gold!

 

can the miura, used in the action scenes, perhaps be indentified by its registration "BO 296", should be a prova-plate from the Bologna-region? (classic & sports car, sept. 2009, 99)

 

So they used the prototype Miura for the movie, very rare then