Lamborghini Countach – The Car’s the Star

With the sad passing of Marcello Gandini last week our thoughts have not only been with his friends and family but also naturally turned towards the various beautiful cars that he designed throughout his prolific and influential career, one of the most famous being the Lamborghini Countach which turns 50 this year. With its striking looks and blistering performance it was a car that captured the hearts and minds of the petrolhead public when it burst onto the scene in 1974. Shooting straight to the top of the desirability charts it remains to this day a captivating and evocative machine and despite being an absolute pig to pilot we would still have one in our hypothetical dream garage in a heartbeat, thank you very much.

If you were a child of the eighties, as is the case with this intrepid writer, then the flames of that passion would no doubt have been fanned by the Lambo’s appearance in the classic Burt Reynolds vehicle (pun very much intended) The Cannonball Run. But it wasn’t just this silver screen saga that helped to lodge the Countach into our collective consciousness and Gandini’s masterpiece would go on to feature in some other high profile movies over the years, too.

We’ve spoken of the history of the Lamborghini Countach before so we won’t go over old ground in this article but we would urge you to have a read if you haven’t done so already. What we do want to talk about here is this raging bull’s starring roles, so without further ado let’s dive in. Lights, camera, action!

The Cannonball Run – 1981

As far as opening scenes go, at least from a car nut’s perspective, the first few minutes of 1981’s action comedy road movie The Cannonball Run are up there with the best of the best. Following the eccentric exploits of a bunch of road racers in a miscellany of motors as they attempt (illegally) to dash from coast to coast across the USA, the film begins with a jet black Lamborghini Countach LP400S (complete with front and rear wings) ripping through the desert at full chat to that beautifully sonorous Giotto Bizzarrini V12 soundtrack.

The car then screeches to a halt as its spandex-clad female passenger jumps out to spray paint over a 55mph speed limit sign before high-tailing off with the police in tow, perfectly setting up the premise and vibe of the movie; a movie based upon the real and very much legendary (and illegal) Cannonball Baker Sea-To-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash. A game of automotive cat and mouse ensues as the opening credits role, resulting in the Lambo dropping a cog and leaving the cops for dead. Absolute Perfection. The car pops up again at various points in the film, driven by Adrienne Barbeau and Tara Buckman as Marcie Thatcher and Jill Rivers respectively (the sequel would go on to feature an LP500S as well), but that opening scene remains its magnum opus.

The Wolf of Wall Street – 2013

Imagine for a second, dear reader, that you’re a stockbroker in the ’80s with a license to print money at the peak of the decade’s excess and affluence. What car are you going to be cutting about in? A Lamborghini Countach 25th Anniversary Edition resplendent in Bianco Polo paint of course. Directed by the legendary Martin Scorsese and based upon the real life exploits of Jordan Belfort, a charismatic but unethical stockbroker who fraudulently acquired almost mythical levels of wealth and power on Wall Street during the 1980s and ’90s, The Wolf of Wall Street is a darkly comic film that documents Belfort’s stratospheric rise and subsequent fall from grace brilliantly.

The Countach is the perfect car for Belfort (flawlessly portrayed by Leonardo DiCaprio) and it consummately represents the trader’s extravagant lifestyle. Unfortunately the car’s fate also mirrors that of our protagonist’s career, ending up as it does completely and utterly totalled. In one of the film’s most memorable scenes DiCaprio’s Belfort takes a few too many Quaaludes rendering him almost paralysed and what follows is over two minutes of laugh out loud cinema that sees the character crawling to the car in order to get in and drive home, including opening the iconic scissor door with his foot. Despite being clearly incapacitated, however, he ostensibly manages the task without further incident, making it home and passing out on the couch.

In the very next scene Belfort is woken up by two policemen who drag him outside whereby he’s confronted by the wrecked Countach. We’re then treated to a flashback montage that shows us what really happened on the drive home and the results are hilarious because as it transpires, and as we suspected, it’s nigh on impossible to drive a 400 plus horsepower supercar when you’re off your bonce on weapons grade sedatives. Sadly the car used was a legitimate 25th Anniversary Edition but it does remain in circulation, fully preserved as a collector’s piece.

Kung Fury – 2015

In a ridiculously over the top homage to ’80s action films this 2015 comedy short not only features a Lamborghini Countach LP500S but also a DeLorean DMC-12 and a cameo by David Hasselhoff, and if that doesn’t scream 1980s while sporting a mullet and holding a boom box aloft then we don’t know what does! Perfectly capturing the zeitgeist of the period with just the right mix of music, martial arts and machine guns (and VHS tracking fuzz), Kung Fury is writer and director David Sandberg’s tongue in cheek love letter to a simpler time in cinema.

As our protagonist’s whip, we’re introduced to the bright red Lambo as Kung Fury jumps off the roof of his apartment building at the beginning of the film before shooting open the scissor door and landing in the driver’s seat whereby he immediately dons a pair of sunglasses (it’s night time by the way), slams the car into first and screeches off into the city to fight an evil robot arcade machine. The film gets increasingly ludicrous from this point on, if you can believe that, and the Countach features in a couple of other scenes, including in animated format.

It’s all very silly but that’s exactly the point and if you’ve got half an hour to spare, a good sense of humour and a healthy appetite for ’80s nostalgia then we highly recommend you give it a watch.

Rain Man – 1988

Much like with The Cannonball Run the opening scene of this 1986 Oscar-winning road movie-cum-family drama heavily features a Lamborghini Countach, again an LP400S but this time without the front wing. Here we see narcissistic car dealer Charlie Babbitt (played by Tom Cruise) overseeing delivery of said red Lambo as it glides into the opening shot attached to a crane, accompanied by the The Belle Stars’ ’89 hit cover version of Iko Iko.

The car is subsequently parked next to three other Countach models including a white LP500S but unfortunately that’s the last we see of them as Cruise drives off in a Ferrari 400i and for the remainder of the film the main steed of choice for Charlie and his autistic brother Raymond’s road trip across America is a 1949 Buick Roadmaster. Still, that initial introduction featuring the Countach is certainly a memorable one and alongside Dustin Hoffman’s award-winning performance as Ray is reason enough to watch this brilliant film.

House of Gucci – 2021

In a film about fashion it’s only fitting that a car renowned for its design should feature, and much like The Wolf of Wall Street the car chosen is a late ’80s Anniversary edition Lamborghini Countach. Starring alongside Adam Driver, Lady Gaga, Al Pacino and Jared Leto the car is in esteemed company, helping to tell the story of how Guccio Gucci built his high fashion empire, creating a brand now synonymous with haute couture.

Directed by Ridley Scott we see Adam Driver’s Maurizio Gucci, who was head of the company in the early nineties, celebrating a big investment in the business by treating himself to the 25th Anniversary Countach, a car that featured myriad improvements over earlier incarnations, including many stylistic enhancements as well as a more powerful, 450bhp V12. Despite the company being in the red during his tenure, Maurizio was renowned for spending his money and a Lamborghini Countach is certainly commensurate with that penchant for the extravagant.

Whether it be a 25th Anniversary edition, an LP500S or even an original LP400, if this list has given you Countach cravings then check out the models we have available right here on Car & Classic.