Taycan Turbo S Turns Stunt Car for Action Movie Rico Torres/Lionsgate – Lionsgate
Den of Thieves 2: Pantera doesn’t have a De Tomaso mid-engine sports car in it. Bummer. But there is a Porsche Taycan Turbo, and that’s a plus. Actually, there were five Taycans.
This is the sequel to 2018’s Den of Thieves and brings back stars Gerard Butler and O’Shea Jackson, Jr. to answer all the questions of character motivation and plot holes left behind by that first movie. And then it creates new questions about character motivation and new plot holes. Like the first, it’s all set around a heist. And like the first, it’s as much about male bonding and the struggle between good and evil as it is about stealing stuff. There’s lots of gunplay, plenty of words not commonly used here, clenched jaws, Marlboros, and beard stubble.
It’s not quite clear whether the “Pantera” part of the title refers to the criminals or the cops. And that messy ambivalence may be the point.
The Taycan looks great. Shot like it was a Playboy centerfold. Better than Glamour-Shots-at-the-mall lustrous. It is the getaway vehicle after the big diamond heist and does things that Porsche Taycans aren’t supposed to do.
Porsche supplied five Taycans to the production to portray the one car. All were factory development vehicles for the Turbo S model and were shipped to Tenerife in the Canary Islands where the film’s climactic chase was shot. All five were never destined to be sold to the public.
The first Taycan was a stock and unmodified Turbo S used to portray the getaway machine in “hero shots.” Those are the shots where the vehicle is pristine and dazzling. It’s the car that’s seen with the actors outside of it.
A second Taycan Turbo S was used as a “pod car.” That’s a vehicle that’s been modified with a driving pod attached to its roof (like the one at the top of this story). A stunt driver in the lofty pod is piloting the vehicle while the actors are emoting and reacting and doing all sorts of action stuff in the cockpit.
“All of the driving control components, including the instrument cluster, ignition, sport response dial, shifter/gear selector, steering wheel, accelerator, brake, and stunt drift brake were moved to the roof of the car and mounted in the driving pod,” explains Porsche spokesperson Jarred Hopkins. “The steering was converted to hydraulic, because there wasn’t enough room to relocate the steering column to the roof of the pod.”
According to the film’s producers, this was the first time an all-electric car was outfitted with a remote-driving pod for filming. However, driving pods have become common tools for shooting car chases. At least common for productions that can afford them.
A third Taycan was gutted and used as a “biscuit rig” vehicle. Essentially, all the things that identify a Taycan as a Taycan—the body, the interior, and most of the sheet metal—are mounted to a mobile camera platform that acts as the Taycan’s chassis. So, in a way, this was a Taycan powered by an internal combustion engine. This allows cameras to peer into the Taycan and capture the actors at work inside.
Gunplay with a Taycan chased by Audi S6 sedans. Rico Torres/Lionsgate – Lionsgate
The fourth and fifth Taycans were stunt cars modified by Porsche to do many silly things. “The changes were a mix of software and mechanical,” Hopkins says. “One of the more daunting requests was that the car had to be able to travel in reverse at up to nearly 60 mph, which required significant software overrides. Connected to this was a hydraulic handbrake, which was used liberally and with dramatic effect!”
Movie car mechanics can work miracles, but the Taycan is one of the world’s most technologically complex vehicles. So, Porsche did most of the modifications on the stunt cars itself. And Porsche had its own personnel on hand during filming. Porsche also says that the cars were charged on Tenerife using Porsche’s consumer charging stations.
Porsche lists the consumer wall chargers at a modest (very modest for Porsche) $1670 on its website. This is, after all, the company that charges $6220 for the “Leather/Race-Tex Interior in Black with Shark Blue Stitching” option on its GT3.
For anyone who likes action movies, Den of Thieves 2 is a solid one. Director Gudegast also wrote the screenplay and knows how to move a camera effectively. Gerard Butler is Scottish, but plays a Los Angeles cop well, and O’Shea Jackson, Jr. has a true straight-from-Hawthorne authenticity. Most of the action is set in France, instead of the original’s Southern California (though largely filmed in Atlanta).
Incidentally, in conversation at California’s Porsche Experience Center, both actors admitted that their daily drivers are Range Rovers. And both deny ever hurling while shooting the action scenes.
Gerard Butler and O’Shea Jackson, Jr. take a Taycan Turbo S into film stardom. There’s a guy on the roof doing the driving. Rico Torres/Lionsgate – Lionsgate
As for the film itself, the plot is too torturous and drawn out. The twist ending isn’t that much of a surprise. The characters often come across as archetypes instead of human beings. And diamonds seem like a slightly outdated heist object now that gem-quality ones are made in labs. Plus, the heist itself is awfully dangerous. Wouldn’t have been easier just to do a smash-and-grab at the Zales in Culver City?
All that aside, however, it’s fun to watch athletic stunt performers doing athletic things before they die gruesome on-screen deaths.
As far as heist films go, this one is a notch behind 2011’s Fast Five, but superior to all the subsequent Fast & Furious films. The gold standard remains Michael Mann’s 1995 classic Heat.
Incidentally, Den of Thieves 2’s director is the son of actor Eric Braeden. And Braeden’s long resume includes a villain turn as Bruno Von Sickle in that 1977 car culture phenom, Herbie Goes To Monte Carlo. And in that Disney film, among the race cars, were at least two De Tomaso Panteras. See, things do come around.
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