''Thunder in Carolina'' is a 1960

stock car racing Stock car racing is a form of automobile racing run on oval tracks and road courses measuring approximately . It originally used production-model cars, hence the name "stock car", but is now run using cars specifically built for racing. It ori ...

film directed by Paul Helmick and starring

Rory Calhoun Rory Calhoun (born Francis Timothy McCown, August 8, 1922April 28, 1999) was an American film and television actor. He starred in numerous Westerns in the 1950s and 1960s, and appeared in supporting roles in films such as ''How to Marry a Millio ...

Alan Hale, Jr. Alan Hale Jr. (born Alan Hale MacKahan; (March 8, 1921 - January 2, 1990) was an American actor and restaurateur. He was the son of actor Alan Hale Sr. His television career spanned four decades, but he was best known for his secondary lead role ...

, and

Connie Hines Connie Hines (March 24, 1931 – December 18, 2009) was an American actress best known for playing Alan Young's wife, Carol Post, on the 1960s sitcom ''Mister Ed''. Biography Hines was one of four children born in Dedham in Norfolk Coun ...

. Written by Alexander Richards, it contains 1959-vintage stock car race footage. Filmed at a number of small dirt ovals in the South, the film is set in the 1959 edition of

NASCAR The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and hi ...

Southern 500 The Southern 500, officially known as the Cook Out Southern 500 for sponsorship reasons, is a NASCAR Cup Series stock car race at Darlington Raceway in Darlington, South Carolina, United States. The race distance is and consists of 367 laps. Fro ...

Darlington Raceway Darlington Raceway is a race track built for NASCAR racing located in Darlington, South Carolina. It is nicknamed "The Lady in Black" and "The Track Too Tough to Tame" by many NASCAR fans and drivers and advertised as "A NASCAR Tradition." It is ...

Darlington, South Carolina Darlington is a city located in Darlington County, South Carolina, United States. In 2010, its population was 6,289. It is the county seat of Darlington County. It is part of the Florence, South Carolina Metropolitan Statistical Area. Darlington ...

Plot

A stock-car veteran (

) teaches a grease monkey to race in the Southern 500 in Darlington, S.C.

Cast

... Mitch Cooper *

... Buddy Schaeffer *

... Rene York * Race Gentry ... Les York (billed as John Gentry) * Ed McGrath ... Reichert * Troyanne Ross ... Kay Hill * Helen Downey ... Eve Mason * Van Casey ... Stoogie * Tripplie Wisecup ... Myrtle Webb *

Carey Loftin William Carey Loftin (January 31, 1914 – March 4, 1997, a.k.a. Cary Loftin, Carry Loftin, Carey Lofton, Gary Loftin, William Carey Loftin) was an American professional stuntman, stunt coordinator and actor in the U.S. film industry. He is ...

... Tommy Webb * Billie Langston ... Peaches * Ann Stevens ... Singer * George Rembert, Jr. ... Junior Thorsen * Olwen Roney ... Motel manager * Richard Taylor ... Higgins * George Fordham ... Waiter

Production

All filming was done during 1959 with much of the footage taken during the actual event. A film car was entered to capture on-track sequences and Rory Calhoun actually ran some laps during the race. Calhoun drives a two-tone 1957

Chevrolet Chevrolet ( ), colloquially referred to as Chevy and formally the Chevrolet Motor Division of General Motors Company, is an American automobile division of the American manufacturer General Motors (GM). Louis Chevrolet (1878–1941) and ous ...

, with a blue body and white top, while his friend-turned-competitor "Les York" is in a 1959

Oldsmobile Oldsmobile or formally the Oldsmobile Division of General Motors was a brand of American automobiles, produced for most of its existence by General Motors. Originally established as "Olds Motor Vehicle Company" by Ransom E. Olds in 1897, it produ ...

. The film is a "B" grade production in terms of budget but ''Thunder In Carolina'' managed to capture much of the sound and fury of the era.

Release

The film had its opening engagements on June 7, 1960 in

Darlington Darlington is a market town in the Borough of Darlington, County Durham, England. The River Skerne flows through the town; it is a tributary of the River Tees. The Tees itself flows south of the town. In the 19th century, Darlington underwen ...

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico an ...

and

Hartsville, South Carolina Hartsville is the largest city in Darlington County, South Carolina, United States. It was chartered on December 11, 1891. The population was 7,764 at the 2010 census. Hartsville was chosen as an All-America City in 1996 and again in 2016. Harts ...

. The film was later marketed on

home video Home video is prerecorded media sold or rented for home viewing. The term originates from the VHS and Betamax era, when the predominant medium was videotapes, but has carried over to optical disc formats such as DVD, Blu-ray and streaming me ...

as ''Hard Drivin'' with a freeze-frame title spliced into the opening.

Reception

It grossed $271,847 in its first week in a 100 theater saturation release in the

Carolinas The Carolinas are the U.S. states of North Carolina and South Carolina, considered collectively. They are bordered by Virginia to the north, Tennessee to the west, and Georgia to the southwest. The Atlantic Ocean is to the east. Combining Nort ...

. The film was released nationally on July 15, 1960.

Quentin Tarantino Quentin Jerome Tarantino (; born March 27, 1963) is an American film director, writer, producer, and actor. His films are characterized by stylized violence, extended dialogue, profanity, Black comedy, dark humor, Nonlinear narrative, non-lin ...

is a fan of the film."QUENTIN TARANTINO: MY FAVOURITE RACING MOVIES" ''F1 Social Diary'' 21 August, 2013
accessed 5 July 2014

References

External links

*
''Thunder in Carolina''
in the

Internet Movie Database IMDb (an abbreviation of Internet Movie Database) is an online database of information related to films, television series, home videos, video games, and streaming content online – including cast, production crew and personal biographies, ...

1960 films 1960s sports films American auto racing films American romantic drama films Films shot in South Carolina NASCAR mass media 1960s English-language films 1960s American films {{sport-film-stub