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Chevrolet Stepside pick-up – The Driver

Updated: 26 January 2015

Ranking: 38      

Year of release: 1978.

The car: 1974 Chevrolet Stepside pick-up.

Why it’s special: Car-chase hedonism at its best. And while the film’s main character tools around in an assuming Chevy for most of the movie, he drives it like no other pick-up has ever been driven in the closing scenes.

Best bit: That orange Mercedes being systematically destroyed in an underground car park – apparently it was sold, in its damaged state, for over £8m.

Pub fact: Ryan O’Neal is achingly cool as The Driver, with an attitude Steve McQueen (who the script was originally written for) would have been jealous of. In total O’Neal utters a mere 350 words.

Plot overview: ‘The Driver’ specialising in getaways from robberies, and has never been caught. One policeman makes it his mission to find him, and sets up a fake robbery to land his target. Can the Driver outwit the law one more time?

For: The final 8-minute car sequence as O’Neal chases down a Pontiac Trans Am in his Stepside.

Against: The movie isn’t well known enough for the Chevy to score any higher.

CAR verdict: Even with Global Warming on our backs, this is a pick-up truck you can openly adore.

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By Ben Pulman

Ex-CAR editor-at-large

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