Car lovers must be very strong now. A web find reveals that the destroyed film Lambo in "The Wolf of Wall Street" is a rare original car.
Did it have to be? Instead of a replica, director Martin Scorsese recreated a drug-fueled ride by notorious stock market shark Jordan Belfort (played by Leonardo DiCaprio) in an original Lamborghini Countach for The Wolf of Wall Street. The movie car is a 1989 Countach 25th Anniversary . Number of units: 657. Admittedly, this is the most-produced production version of the V12 flask, but given the collector's condition of the super sports car, which has only covered 7,000 miles (approx. 11,265 km), this choice causes regret.
According to their own information, the simple username "basic" hides an agent who earns his money with car equipment for Hollywood productions. In addition to "The Wolf of Wall Street", he also claims to have procured the hero cars for "The Thomas Crown Affair", "War of the Worlds" and "American Gangster".
In the standard work of the film car world, www.imcdb.org (Internet Movie Cars Database) he comments on the Scorsese Lambo entry as follows:
"This, unfortunately was a real 1989 Lambo Anniversary edition with 7K original miles, one of 23 built white/white for the USA. We tried to use a kit, but Scorsese would not go for the way the car crumpled. He wanted a real one. I can tell you from all the cars used, he was TRUE to the book. The most expensive car I have ever supplied for a movie, and killed."
In German: "Unfortunately, it was a genuine 1989 Lamborghini Anniversary Edition with 7,000 miles (11,265 km, editor's note) on the clock, one of 23 US models with white paintwork and a white interior. "We made experiments with a replica but Scorsese wasn't satisfied with the way this car deformed. He wanted a real one. I can tell you all the movie cars he used were meticulously selected. This was the most expensive car I've ever bought for got a movie and killed."
Cost question: Was the Lambo destruction worth it?
In view of the high profits that successful Hollywood blockbusters usually bring in, it would probably have been smarter in retrospect to have a replica made of tin (instead of cheap plastic). This was recently shown in the latest James Bond film "No Time to Die", in which a deceptively real replica DB5 was badly damaged as a stunt car.
This assumption can also be confirmed by looking at the last auction results that were achieved by comparable Countach. The new owner of an early Countach "Periscopio" paid around 950,000 euros in November 2021. Whether the decision to permanently damage such a collector's car was worth it or not can still be doubted ten years after the shooting. It is unclear what happened to the car after the film was completed. Due to the high value and the apparently undamaged basic structure of the car, it can be assumed that the vehicle was repaired and later resold.
Conclusion
If the statements about Scorsese's ideas are correct, he was probably trying to make the car look as authentic as possible even when it crashed. However, the relevant film sequences are rather short and can sometimes only be seen while driving faster. Dear Mr. Scorsese: There are several deceptively real Countach replicas online, some even based on a VW Beetle. Next time, please spare such a rare vehicle from dying on the big screen.
