"Eleanor" Gone in sixty seconds Mustang GT500 legal battles
Discussion
Not sure if y'ou all are interested, but been following this, I subscribe to a YouTube channel called "B is for build", a very sell effacing chap called Chris who undertakes some pretty ambitious and impressive car builds, despite some serious health issues over the last couple of years.
He decided to make a "backdated" Mustang, making a crashed Mustang GT 5.0 to look like a sixties Mustang GT500, the mistake he made was suggesting it was loosely based on the car from the 2000 Gone in Sixty Seconds remake.
The Eleanor Mustang is a grey, lightly modified first gen GT500, which looks pretty good to be fair but the widow of the films director/stuntman, he was killed filming the sequel to the original Gone in Sixty Seconds from 1974. Its recognizable but just not that highly modified. Eleanor is also a yellow 1971 Mustang in the 1974 film of the same name.
His widow jealously guarded the likeness of the "Eleanor" Mustangs, think it was her pension.
Based on Chris from B is for Build suggesting he was going for a sort of similar look to "Eleanor", after a series of videos of progress he was given a cease and desist order, had to take the videos down, the car was seized and taken from his, as is, about three quarters finished. They even went after him for a later model modified Mustang that looked nothing like the film cars, just a black, slightly tarted up run of the mill Mustang, a measure of how unpleasant and grasping these people are.
I, and most of the commentators though this was a cruel and cynical move, and the car wasn't even finished, simply saying that was the kind of look he was going for was enough to get the car taken from him, seems such a tenuous position to be able to take someone car from given it looked nothing like it at that point, its like that film Minority Report where you can be arrested for things you havent yet done.
Its funny as so many (Much more famous/recognizable) movie cars get many recreations and studios seem to just let folk get on with it, Ecto 1, The A team van, KITT, General Lee etc etc, just seems like Denice just wanted an income stream as didnt have one otherwise. But personally I think its reprehensible how aggressive she was and I think common sense has prevailed, would say most of the intellectual property is Ford and Shelbys so seems right Shelby won.
If all is at it seems I really hope she is seriously pissed off about it and has to compensate all the folk she has taken legal action against.
https://driving.ca/auto-news/entertainment/court-l...
And this is Chris's take on matters,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3JHy7gK4to
He decided to make a "backdated" Mustang, making a crashed Mustang GT 5.0 to look like a sixties Mustang GT500, the mistake he made was suggesting it was loosely based on the car from the 2000 Gone in Sixty Seconds remake.
The Eleanor Mustang is a grey, lightly modified first gen GT500, which looks pretty good to be fair but the widow of the films director/stuntman, he was killed filming the sequel to the original Gone in Sixty Seconds from 1974. Its recognizable but just not that highly modified. Eleanor is also a yellow 1971 Mustang in the 1974 film of the same name.
His widow jealously guarded the likeness of the "Eleanor" Mustangs, think it was her pension.
Based on Chris from B is for Build suggesting he was going for a sort of similar look to "Eleanor", after a series of videos of progress he was given a cease and desist order, had to take the videos down, the car was seized and taken from his, as is, about three quarters finished. They even went after him for a later model modified Mustang that looked nothing like the film cars, just a black, slightly tarted up run of the mill Mustang, a measure of how unpleasant and grasping these people are.
I, and most of the commentators though this was a cruel and cynical move, and the car wasn't even finished, simply saying that was the kind of look he was going for was enough to get the car taken from him, seems such a tenuous position to be able to take someone car from given it looked nothing like it at that point, its like that film Minority Report where you can be arrested for things you havent yet done.
Its funny as so many (Much more famous/recognizable) movie cars get many recreations and studios seem to just let folk get on with it, Ecto 1, The A team van, KITT, General Lee etc etc, just seems like Denice just wanted an income stream as didnt have one otherwise. But personally I think its reprehensible how aggressive she was and I think common sense has prevailed, would say most of the intellectual property is Ford and Shelbys so seems right Shelby won.
If all is at it seems I really hope she is seriously pissed off about it and has to compensate all the folk she has taken legal action against.
https://driving.ca/auto-news/entertainment/court-l...
And this is Chris's take on matters,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3JHy7gK4to
I remember when this all unfolded and it just didn't seem like real life - I mean how can you have any say over a cars' likeness to an on-screen portrayal in a movie? Madness. If Shelby had gone after the builder then it would have been sh*tty but they would almost have more grounds for it, but the widow of a tenuously-linked stuntman? WTF. Just a shame that she stole all of that time and momentum away from the project, I hope it is returned and completed as intended.
Isn't there something equally aggressive from the likes of Mercedes going after replicas of its' original SL Gullwing? Or have I dreamt that?
Isn't there something equally aggressive from the likes of Mercedes going after replicas of its' original SL Gullwing? Or have I dreamt that?
Gassing Station | TV, Film, Streaming & Radio | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff