Category Archives: Movie Bricks

Margot at the Wedding

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Jack Black driving a Volvo 245 seems like a pretty good match, at least in the movie “Margot at the Wedding” They’re both low rent, worn-out beaters just trying to get by. The red brick in this movie should get a supporting actor credit because it plays a minor role in the action of the film.

Midway through the movie the characters are driving from a pool party when Jack complains that the brakes aren’t working right (sounds like me back in November). Later in the film Nicole Kidman’s character is driving the car with her sister and son when the brakes give out again. This time she’s unable to get them to engage and drives off into a ditch, causing Jennifer Jason Leigh to soil her panties. Ugh.

Here’s an interpretation of the scene I found on YouTube. Someone edited the original film footage with their own video of high-heeled feet stabbing at the brake pedal. Audio may be NSFW.

I thought Margot at the Wedding was a great movie but, since it delved so deeply in the pathos of these fairly unlikable characters, it’s probably not for everyone.

Farah Goes Bang

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I think film schools across the country have taught students that if you’re going to make a movie about a road trip then you have to cast a Volvo 240 in the lead role. Once again we have an indie film featuring a group of liberal 20 year olds riding in a classic brick.

The film Farah Goes Bang is the story of a group of women who travel around America campaigning for John Kerry. Like all good Democrats they do so from the comfort of the classic Swedish wagon. Many great shots in the film trailer below.

Turn Me On, Dammit!

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Turn Me On, Dammit! is a coming of age film set in Skoddeheimen, Norway. The teens in the film wait outside a store to score some beer and are luck enough to have a dude in a light blue Volvo 245 pull up and buy it for them. Later in the film the same brick gives a ride to the lead character, Alma, in her quest to find peace of mind in Oslo.

Fun Size

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If you’ve ever wondered what it would look like if a giant rooster humped a Volvo 245 you’re in luck. This weekend marks the release of “Fun Size”, a Halloween themed movie starring Victoria Justice and featuring a slick yellow brick as a goofy nerd’s inadvertent party vehicle. The hilarity meets its climax at the local drive in when the wagon is backed into a huge fowl. Oh the humanity!


The banana brick even made it to the movie poster. Click for the full image.

The Lives of Others

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Recently the 2006 German film “Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others)” has been popping up in articles I’ve read and I finally got around to seeing it. This is an excellent film about life in East Germany in the late 1980s and explores the inhumanity of stifling personal freedom and the inevitable corruption that comes from a system of spying and secret police.


I wouldn’t be writing about the movie if there weren’t an old brick in it and I have to say I was surprised to see one. If a member of the Stasi, Germany’s state security service, was going to be riding around in a limo I would have thought it would be a Benz. But bloated Minister Bruno Hempf is driven around in a gorgeous, dark blue 200 series Volvo limo throughout the film. Unfortunately the interior shots are from a Mercedes or BMW.

According to comments on the Internet Movie Cars Database entry for the film, Volvo/Bertone created these limos specifically for the German government.

The Diesel Decision: A Short Story

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Beardy McBrick was traveling to the annual hacky sack festival with his buds when he came upon the most dreaded of obstacles: a hill. He warned his friends it would be a long, hard slog in his diesel 245 and that they should just relax. “Bummer,” his buddy Phil said. “At least we have a good way to pass the time,” Phil chuckled as he handed around his packed chillum.

An hour later they’d past the half-way mark when something blue flashed in McBrick’s smog-coated side-view mirror. It was a car; a diesel in fact. But this was no ancient Benz or Volvo. It was a BMW, and it was coming up fast. “Maybe you should slow down and let him pass,” his girlfriend, Sunflower, suggested. And he did. They looked in awe as the strange rocket car passed by with nary a puff of smoke. Phil stared with mouth agape as the blue streak sped over the apex and out of sight. “Damn, McBrick!” he exclaimed, “you shoulda’ bought that car instead of taking this donation from your English professor.”

“Yeah…” McBrick thought, as he looked with dread at the climb ahead, “then these damn hills wouldn’t be such a drag.” The wagons’s exhaust belched a dark cloud and woke McBrick from his day-dream. “Hey Phil!” he shouted good-naturedly, “quit bogarting and share the love!” They all laughed. McBrick flipped his cassette of Shakedown Street and settled in for the rest of the hill.

– Inspired by “Changes”, an ad for diesel engined BMWs.

Fred’s Brick in “Hop”

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Until yesterday I was blissfully unaware of the film “Hop”. Now it looks like I may have to bring my kids to this Easter movie tomorrow afternoon. In checking out the trailer I see we have another movie brick.

Here we have the standard movie trope of the down-on-his-luck character driving a beater brick. Fred, played by James Marsden, is an “out-of-work slacker” who drives his 240 wagon into a rabbit. Not a VW Rabbit, but E.B., son of the Easter bunny, who proceeds to drop turds on the hood of Fred’s brick. But those are no ordinary turds; they’re jelly beans. Does Meguiar’s have anything for that?

Either Fred owns two cars or he swapped his head restraints between scenes. How else to explain the black interior in the publicity still with the beige interior from the frame grab. I’m sure it’s just a Movie Mistake, but I wonder if the prop peeps needed 2 cars because they destroyed one in a colossal stunt. Unfortunately it looks like I’m going to have to see the movie to find out.

Nicolas Cage: Driving Angy Beige Volvos?

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Here’s the latest action flick from Nic Cage, “Drive Angry“.  He rips around in some late 60’s muscle cars, which is the height of originality. It’s like Cage wants to out-cool Kurt Russel in “Death Proof“, but just looks like a dude cranking his stick shift with a nubile Daisy Duke.

But it wasn’t always Chargers and Mustangs for Nicolas Cage. In the 90’s he drove Volvos in three different movies, forming the “Beige Volvo Trilogy.” Find out more, after the jump.

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