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The movie Gran Turismo opens today for “sneak preview” in many theaters and nationwide on August 25.Based on the PlayStation video game of the same name, it also takes its story from the real-life adventures of racer Jann Mardenborough, who got his start via PlayStation’s GT Academy.Watch for spoilers ahead, but we confess we enjoyed this movie. At this point, hating on motorsports movies is a required activity to retain car-guy cred. You drive stick, you went to Radwood before Hagerty bought it, and you can name every automotive inaccuracy in every racing movie from Barney Oldfield’s Race for a Life in 1913—real racing almost never involves having to rescue a lady tied to the railroad tracks—to the recent Ford v. Ferrari in 2019—The Corvette hood! It’s wrong!Sony PicturesWe’re certainly not immune, having hated on our share of vehicular cinema. So we went into the screening of Sony Pictures’ video-game docudrama Gran Turismo with a ready serving of jaded irritation in our hearts. Know what? It’s not that bad. Initially, hearing Sony was making a Gran Turismo movie, we assumed it would be a cartoonish fictional piece; an empty-headed, bang-shifted, action movie at best, a chaotic two-hour commercial for the PlayStation Gran Turismo video game (sorry, driving simulator) at worst. While there is plenty of product placement in Gran Turismo, the plot is based on a true story and has some genuinely thought-provoking and heart-pounding moments among the crashes and clichés. If You Keep Going, Watch for SPOILERS AHEAD Gran Turismo is more than loosely based on the story of a racer who got his start in Nissan PlayStation’s GT Academy, which was a marketing move by Nissan and Sony to take high-performing drivers from the virtual world of online Gran Turismo competition to real-life race cars. Many of the participants did go on to race in GT and endurance classes. The movie follows Jann Mardenborough, the 2011 winner, who went on to a class podium at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, although it makes free with what years and in which cars events occurred. Sony PicturesYes,Gran Turismo does stupid movie things like, my personal peeve, constantly have the drivers glare at each other through the side window.Right off the bat, yes, Gran Turismo does stupid movie motorsports things like have the driver put their foot down mid-straightaway and suddenly have more speed, or send crashing cars skyward in balls of flame, or—a personal peeve—constantly have the drivers glare at each other through the side window as if they aren’t locked in neck restraints and hopefully paying attention to their racing lines. It also compresses years into months, invents people who didn’t exist, and rearranges Mardenborough’s timeline in multiple ways to make for uninterrupted drama. We’re not going to list every instance, because we’d be here all day, but know that if you’re writing a school paper on Mardenborough, Gran Turismo is not a reliable source for your facts. This content is imported from youTube. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.Now, if you just want to spend some time in a nice air-conditioned theatre with the sound of racing cars and some pleasant-faced actors to look at, you could do far worse than a ticket for Gran Turismo. Archie Madekwe plays Mardenborough with an earnest sweetness. It’s refreshing to have a racing main character whose primary personality characteristic isn’t aggressive confidence. Madekwe, who grew up in London, not only didn’t have any racing experience going in, but didn’t even have a driver’s license when he accepted the role. “I would get home from this other job I was filming, and take a driving lesson that night. The producers kept on phoning me. ‘Have you passed yet? Have you passed yet?’ and as soon as I did, they sent me a simulator, and then I had to learn to drive in the game too.” The real Mardenborough does much of the on-track stunt driving in the film, but Madekwe is proud to say that all the gaming scenes in the film are his driving.Stranger Things’ David Harbour Is a StandoutThe scene stealer is Stranger Things’ David Harbour, again playing a gruff adoptive father figure. Harbour plays fictional driving coach Jack Salter, who battles his own failures as he attempts to ready Mardenborough to face off against snobs in Porsches and rich, mean boys in golden Lamborghinis. This seems to involve a lot of dropping heavy emotional stuff on Mardenborough as he’s on track, which we would argue is a poor approach to coaching, but their relationship in the movie is the most developed and engaging of the movie. Some Weak PointsMost of the other characters are supporting at best, the bad guy being a bad guy just because we need one, the girl invented because it’s 2023 so we need one. Two, really: Mardenborough’s fictional love interest is played by Maeve Courtier-Lilley, and his scrappy fellow GT Academy participant will be a familiar face to Corvette racing fans, Emelia Hartford. Both are pleasant; neither is necessary to the story. Sony PicturesOne wishes for more detailed character development of either of Mardenborough’s parents, who travel the typical movie arc from lovingly disgusted with his gaming ambitions to supportive once he proves it’s a possible career—or the Nissan marketing executive based on Darren Cox. In the movie he’s reimagined as Danny Moore, played by Orlando Bloom with such bad hair that the real Cox should be offended. Moore’s character bounces between heroic out-of-the-box thinking in coming up with the GT Academy and an intriguing, but never followed up on, moment of villainy when he attempts to rig the academy results in favor of the more polished and more white second-place finisher. Visually, Gran Turismo is torn between director Neill Blomkamp’s gritty realism and an obvious Sony push for pandering to video-game fans. The occasional game graphics that overlay the action could be funny or expository if they happened more regularly, but as it is, they take the viewer out of the story without adding much but a reminder as to who paid for the movie. Otherwise, the shots are wide and exciting, the cars dice it up with a sense of physicality, and it’s a pleasure to see endurance racing and scenes of contemporary Le Mans on the big screen. Trivia moment: The final Le Mans scenes were shot in Hungary, at the Hungaroring F1 track, which was dressed up to look like France. The first half of Gran Turismo is slow, so eat your popcorn and take your bathroom breaks then. The second half, which follows Mardenborough’s push to qualify for a license and the 24 Hours of Le Mans, is much more energetic. It may be unrealistic in its superfast leap from gamer chair to GT qualifying, but it’s interesting to see depictions of multiple race losses on screen. These days, when fans bemoan even a momentary slump in a favorite driver’s performance, it’s good to get a reminder that the real world involves a lot of backmarker moments. Sony PicturesThe slough of Mardenborough’s despond comes towards the end of the film when a crash at the Nürburgring results in the death of a spectator. This is based on a real event in Mardenborough’s career, although one that happened several years after Le Mans. In interviews, Mardenborough says that including the incident was important to him. “It’s part of my life. It is my life . . . It’s a very dark moment in my career and in my life as a person,” he told the Daily Express. We were surprised to see it depicted, not just because it’s a shocking moment in the story, but because it takes the plot somewhere much darker and sadder than the rest of the movie seems to be leading. In the end, there’s plenty to hate on in Gran Turismo, if you desire to keep the tradition alive, but there’s also a lot to like, from the unusual hero to the detailed pit boxes and track backgrounds. If nothing else, you’ll come out with a desire for a PlayStation setup, which is likely Sony’s main goal. FilmographySenior Editor, FeaturesLike a sleeper agent activated late in the game, Elana Scherr didn’t know her calling at a young age. Like many girls, she planned to be a vet-astronaut-artist, and came closest to that last one by attending UCLA art school. She painted images of cars, but did not own one. Elana reluctantly got a driver’s license at age 21 and discovered that she not only loved cars and wanted to drive them, but that other people loved cars and wanted to read about them, which meant somebody had to write about them. Since receiving activation codes, Elana has written for numerous car magazines and websites, covering classics, car culture, technology, motorsports, and new-car reviews.     More

The original Smokey and the Bandit was so popular, the studio couldn’t stop at just one.Smokey and the Bandit II reprised Burt Reynolds in the titular role, again costarring with a black-and-gold Pontiac Trans Am, this time a Turbo model.This 1980 Turbo Trans Am wears that same livery and is signed by Reynolds himself.Car and DriverForty-six years ago, audiences cheered on a cowboy-hatted ne’er do-well as he headed eastbound and down, loaded up and trucking. Equipped with little more than a CB radio, a total lack of respect for the law, one heck of a mustache, and a screaming quick Pontiac Firebird Trans Am, the man they called Bandit stole our hearts. Now you too can roll like the Bandit in a car literally bearing his signature.Bring a TrailerUp for auction on Bring A Trailer—which, like Car and Driver, is part of Hearst Autos—is this 1980 Pontiac Firebird Turbo Trans Am with just 9000 miles on the odometer. Apart from the model year, it’s an identical match for the car Burt Reynolds drove in 1980’s Smokey and the Bandit II, complete with gold accents and that iconic screaming chicken on the hood.Iconic is a word that gets a bit overworked in the automotive world, but a Bandit Trans Am deserves it. When it rolled onto screens in the original 1977 movie, Firebird sales skyrocketed. The second-generation Firebird was late in its run, but Pontiac was so overwhelmed with demand that it actually pushed off the development of the third-gen model a few years.Bring a TrailerThe original first Bandit car was a 1976 model with snowflake-style wheels and a “6.6 Litre” sticker on the hood. The cars were fitted with the front clip from the ’77 model, and only one of the four survived filming.Bandit II saw both Burt Reynolds and Jackie Gleason (as the memorable Sheriff Buford T. Justice) reprising their roles, but a new Pontiac for the Bandit to drive. Pontiac knew getting its latest product in front of Bandit fans was key, especially as emissions restrictions had seen its larger displacement engine options taken off the table. Thus, Bandit would now drive a Turbo Trans Am, with a 4.9-liter V-8 equipped with a Garrett TB305 turbocharger. A three-speed automatic was the only transmission option.Bring a TrailerWhen new, stock power levels were rated at a modest 210 horsepower, but a stout 345 pound-feet of torque gave the Bandit plenty of grunt to spin those BFGoodrich tires. This example has the desired Y84 Special Edition package, which includes those glass T-tops, 15-inch gold Turbo wheels, and quad exhaust pipes—everything you need.Bring a TrailerBest of all, this car bears the gold signature of Burt Reynolds himself, written on the dashboard. Reynolds died in 2018, and back when the Bandit films were entertaining crowds, he was one of the biggest box office draws of them all.Related StoriesHe’d have other roles of course, but the one that went the distance was as everyone’s favorite Bandit. A black-and-gold Pontiac Firebird Trans Am was a big part of that character, and this one looks like a great way to relive the magic. Just keep an eye out for those smokeys. The auction ends August 15.Contributing EditorBrendan McAleer is a freelance writer and photographer based in North Vancouver, B.C., Canada. He grew up splitting his knuckles on British automobiles, came of age in the golden era of Japanese sport-compact performance, and began writing about cars and people in 2008. His particular interest is the intersection between humanity and machinery, whether it is the racing career of Walter Cronkite or Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki’s half-century obsession with the Citroën 2CV. He has taught both of his young daughters how to shift a manual transmission and is grateful for the excuse they provide to be perpetually buying Hot Wheels. More

On Wednesday in New York City, the wraps came off the 2025 Cadillac Escalade IQ.The new Escalade is a full-size battery-electric SUV with three rows of seats, all the luxury Cadillac can offer (for under $340,000, anyway), and a projected 450 miles of range.At the unveiling event, several Cadillac executives and GM president Mark Reuss spoke with Car and Driver about the car’s technology and its place in the market. Here’s what we learned.play iconThe triangle icon that indicates to playThe 2025 Cadillac Escalade IQ does carry Cadillac badges and have its own sheetmetal, shape, and interior, but the underpinnings of the Escalade IQ are actually straight from the GMC Hummer EV. To be fair, both are from GM’s Ultium modular battery architecture, which comes in a remarkable variety of sizes and formats—from the hulking, absurdly fast Hummer EV all the way down to a future generation of Chevrolet Bolt EV. The same platform used by the IQ also underpins the Chevy Silverado EV pickup truck and its counterpart, the GMC Sierra EV.Get the Full Details and SpecsThe electric Escalade’s specifications will sound awfully familiar to any Hummer EV owner, though. It has the same 24 battery modules as the Hummer EV pickup, providing more than 200 kilowatt-hours of energy, front and rear motor units, rear-wheel steering, and 800-volt charging (but not operating) capability as the electric off-roader. Wheelbases of the electric Hummer pickup and the Escalade differ by less than an inch, but that Hummer offers quicker acceleration: 3.0 seconds to 60 mph using the special “Watts to Freedom” (WTF) mode, while the Cadillac’s zero-to-60 time is quoted at “less than five seconds” with its own special mode, which has the more dignified name of Velocity Max. Second Escalade IQ Version?GM president Mark Reuss very briefly teased the idea that in the future, a second variant of the Escalade IQ might appear, “for those buyers who want more room.” Asked if he meant a stretch version like today’s Escalade ESV, Reuss grinned. “I didn’t say bigger,” he said. Then he changed the subject. Different Proportions, Less IntimidatingThe IQ that debuted on Wednesday is visually more different than you might expect compared with the current Escalade, although the dimensions are similar. Its overall length of 224.3 inches is between that of today’s standard model and the stretched ESV (at 211.9 and 227.0 inches), while its 76.1-inch height is a fraction of an inch shorter and its 94.0-inch width (with mirrors extended) is more than a foot wider.On the other hand, the IQ’s 136.2-inch wheelbase exceeds those of both the standard and ESV versions (120.9 and 134.1 inches, respectively), pushing the wheels to the corners as much as possible to allow more length for the battery between the two axles. We didn’t get a chance to see the present and future Escalades side by side, where the differences in dimensions might have been more visible. But aerodynamics is a tough discipline; any EV must push aside as little air as possible to minimize the turbulence that causes drag and eats energy. GM claims the Escalade IQ is 15 percent more aerodynamic than any previous full-size SUV.Importantly, in an era where the height of large trucks blocks drivers’ views of people outside the vehicles, the IQ’s cowl height of 54.0 inches above the ground equals that of the gasoline/diesel Escalade (by our rough measurements of each vehicle at the event). It should feel familiar to existing Escalade drivers, though the roofline falls toward the angled rear window.Perceptually, it’s still a very large and imposing SUV. But the raked liftgate and the beveled nose with its smaller grille or shield make it somewhat less intimidating than the gasoline Escalade with a flatter hood and more bluff front end with its huge radiator intake. And the IQ certainly doesn’t have the long, square tail and upright liftgate of the gasoline versions.Charging Ports In the gallery of press images provided to reporters, there’s a shot of a fast-charging cord plugged into the Escalade IQ’s charging port. It’s very clearly the CCS standard that GM has used for eight years now. Wait, you say, didn’t General Motors announce in June it will switch over to the Tesla connector (known as NACS) and give its drivers access to the Tesla Supercharger network, following Ford’s similar groundbreaking announcement of the same thing the month before? Well, yes. But, didn’t GM also announce it is among the seven automakers who have jointly committed to funding their own nationwide DC fast-charging network of 30,000 charging stations, starting next year—one that will use the CCS standard as well as the Tesla connector? Yes, that too.To make matters even more confusing, one day before the Escalade IQ broke cover, GM said all Ultium vehicles will offer vehicle-to-home (V2H) backup-power capability, more formally known as bidirectional charging, by 2026. This ability is built into the spec for the CCS connector, but not the Tesla connector. While the Tesla plug is electrically capable of feeding power out, the company hasn’t implemented it, perhaps because Tesla sells PowerWall backup batteries to homeowners—and enabling its cars to serve the same function could damage that business. Nonetheless, the Escalade IQ promises V2H capability via an over-the-air software update during the 2025 model year. Know Your EVsWe asked GM president Reuss about the state of the charging landscape today, and how we should sort all this out. He confirmed the adoption of the Tesla connector—”We’re doing it as fast as we can”—but also “compatibility with the SAE standard” (the Tesla connector is not actually a technical standard as yet). He did add the qualifier “for now” to CCS compatibility.Okay, so does that mean future GM Ultium EVs will switch over from one connector to the other, or could they have both? “That will change with time,” Reuss said. “We don’t have a definitive answer today, on where it goes, what the ultimate [arrangement] is. We have to be able to do both.”We surmise GM’s battery and charging engineers are digging into the Tesla plug and connector and software right now—trying to understand how it works, its safety margins, and how to make it compatible with vehicles that don’t run on Tesla OS software. Stay tuned on this one.GM’s own Mobile Phone InterfaceIf you expect Android Auto or Apple CarPlay capability as a standard feature in any new car you consider, you’re out of luck for any of the upcoming GM vehicles on the Ultium architecture—including the Escalade IQ. GM will discontinue the standard phone mirroring capability starting with the 2024 Chevrolet Blazer EV, for which deliveries should start this quarter or next.Car and Driver asked Reuss what will replace those functions. Under GM’s replacement systems, he said, drivers and passengers will be able to do everything they can do now using either of those two connectivity protocols. And he acknowledged the skepticism among reporters and vehicle shoppers on hearing the familiar Android Auto and Apple CarPlay would no longer work.When reporters get access to the Blazer EV, sometime this fall, we’ll see how it works in practice. Until then, the jury is clearly out.Tough Timing for GMThe Escalade IQ debut came at a tough time for GM. It has struggled to get its first high-volume Ultium cell plant, in Ohio, up to full-scale production to provide the volumes of cells needed to supply the tens of thousands of Ultium vehicles a month it projects it will sell by the end of the year. In the words of one battle-scarred battery engineer, getting a new cell chemistry, in a new plant, with new staff, up and running at sufficient volume and acceptable yields, is “really, really, really, really, really, really, really hard”—and GM is doing that twice in one year. Reuss said the company is now “fully capacitized” at its first cell plant, with the second one in Spring Hill, Tennessee, following closely behind. If so, the company’s EV sales figures for the third and fourth quarters of this year had better reflect it. For the first half of the year, the bulk of GM’s electric-car sales were the two-car lineup of aging Bolt EV and EUV models, both compact hatchbacks using a seven-year-old battery architecture. The Cadillac Lyriq and GMC Hummer EVs are already in production (though Hummer sales halted due to a months-long battery recall), and the Chevy Silverado EV, Blazer EV, and Equinox EV, plus the GMC Sierra EV, are hot on their heels—with the electric Escalade now added on top of that.GM Goes Traditional, Follows TeslaWhen GM developed the EV1 almost 30 years ago, it was a highly aerodynamic two-seater by necessity. The lead-acid battery technology of the time simply didn’t hold enough energy for its weight to propel a conventional four-seat vehicle. Then came the Toyota Prius, in several generations of increasingly odd-looking vehicles—and the Nissan Leaf which followed in 2010 was blatantly, distinctively unusual looking. It was also a compact hatchback, then the most popular vehicle type globally, if not in North America. GM’s own Chevrolet Volt was also a compact hatchback, with the additional complication of being a plug-in hybrid—a powertrain that to this day salespeople and shoppers don’t necessarily understand.But throughout automotive history, new and advanced technologies have come in at the high end, either in luxury or sporting vehicles. From the first electric self-starter in 1912—on a Cadillac—to automatic transmissions, disc brakes, turbochargers, and all the rest, high-end vehicles offered more profit margin to offset the costs of the new technologies.Tesla understood this; it started with a high-performance Roadster, at a six-figure price, then followed it with the mass-produced Model S at prices of $50,000 and above. Now GM, with its emphasis on the Hummer EV and Escalade IQ, plus their Silverado and Sierra EV pickup siblings, is putting its EV technology first into high-end vehicles as well. Get the Full Story on the Escalade IQContributing EditorJohn Voelcker edited Green Car Reports for nine years, publishing more than 12,000 articles on hybrids, electric cars, and other low- and zero-emission vehicles and the energy ecosystem around them. He now covers advanced auto technologies and energy policy as a reporter and analyst. His work has appeared in print, online, and radio outlets that include Wired, Popular Science, Tech Review, IEEE Spectrum, and NPR’s “All Things Considered.” He splits his time between the Catskill Mountains and New York City and still has hopes of one day becoming an international man of mystery. More

Ford revealed a new “Code Orange” styling package for the 2024 Bronco Raptor. The visual package adds orange accents throughout the interior and exterior of the Bronco.Order banks for the 2024 Bronco lineup are officially scheduled to open on August 16.Ford is adding some additional visual flair to the 2024 Bronco Raptor. The company revealed a new styling package dubbed Code Orange, and—yep—it adds a bunch of orange accents throughout the car. FordThe exterior of Code Orange–ified Braptors displays a tasteful amount of orange paint. The tow hooks and beadlock rings are finished in the color, and the rear half of the car is plastered with a digital graphic. Unfortunately, the package seems to add a bit more orange to the exterior of the car than the interior. Ford didn’t release interior photos, but the only mention of orange accents in the interior refers to pairing orange seatbelts with a black interior. We would’ve loved to see something a bit more daring like orange carpeting or orange cloth seats throughout the cabin.FordStarting in 2024, customers will also be able to order the Bronco Raptor with paint-matched fenders, something Ford says fulfills a consumer demand for a more customizable exterior. To that end, the Bronco Raptor adds two more paint colors in addition to the Code Orange package. Velocity Blue was previously offered on the standard Bronco and Bronco Sport, and now joins the Raptor lineup, as does Shelter Green, which Ford says is meant to recall its history of building off-road vehicles for the U.S. Army during World War II (Jeep, are you listening?). FordMore on the BraptorIn an attempt to the avoid long wait times that have impacted the Bronco in the past, Ford is reducing production complexity in an attempt to shorten manufacturing time, so certain equipment combinations might no longer be available. All 2024 Bronco models now come standard with a 12.0-inch touchscreen infotainment system, replacing the previous 8.0-inch screen on lower trims, and the Badlands trim now comes standard with the upgraded modular front bumper. Order books for the 2024 Bronco lineup are scheduled to open on August 16, and Ford plans to announce pricing specifics then. Associate News EditorJack Fitzgerald’s love for cars stems from his as yet unshakable addiction to Formula 1. After a brief stint as a detailer for a local dealership group in college, he knew he needed a more permanent way to drive all the new cars he couldn’t afford and decided to pursue a career in auto writing. By hounding his college professors at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, he was able to travel Wisconsin seeking out stories in the auto world before landing his dream job at Car and Driver. His new goal is to delay the inevitable demise of his 2010 Volkswagen Golf. More