drowning mona yugo cars

i find it interesting that visionary vehicles still lists 172 duane st. in tribeca as their headquarters. Enterior wall panels were thin cardboard with painted on carpet flecks. The film also stars Neve Campbell, Jamie Lee Curtis, Casey Affleck, William Fichtner, Marcus Thomas, and Peter Dobson. The result is that the UK Yugo was a far superior car to the US one, with its dealership network out to make a quick buck. The mechanical bits all seemed OK, and no obvious leaks or other damage. The Florida was reviewed very positively in the UK against western cars, and sadly only failed here because of the rise of Fascism in Yugoslavia, and its aftermath.. I saw it on the Helena streets quite a lot, but it was the only one in the city. Unpaid claims included some warranty work done by dealers on Yugos before sales collapsed. ), See all comments about this movie and its vehicles. I have known folks like that too. } I would be *shocked* to see a single one moving under its own power in 2011. . They obviously do not run. Yeah, theres no question on really poor build quality. There where lots of Yugo's used in the movie, but this was my favorite scene. His last notable brush with the automotive world (in 2004) involved a vague alliance with (uh-oh) Chinese auto maker Chery. She picked them up for virtually nothing and was content with bare-bones transportation. @Zackman: No the real experience was driving that thing in Atlanta rush hour traffic at 80+ MPH. With just 25 horsepower (at a cacophonous 5500 RPM), the elfin 360 was the type of cynical exercise that would define Bricklins career in the car business. What do you call a Yugo with twin exhausts? That's not who I am. My dad is a bit of a FIAT nut so he would wrench on it from time to time. The prototypical belt-driven OHC engine Stateside, was the Pontiac Sixand Joe Sherlock, who has a car blog, The View Through the Windshield (http://www.joesherlock.com/blog.html) was involved in the development of the initial fiberglass-impregnated belt. This was not a design fault, but like the Corvair, the company seriously underestimated the ability of the American motorist to neglect even basic maintenence. So, with connections, he was brought to Japan for a series of lectures; and if America wasnt interested, Japan was very much so. The last ones left in my hometown got a stay of execution when the city received a good number of Bosnian refugees in the 90s; many of them bought Yugos and got mobile for next to nothing since they knew how to keep them running. I could be wrong there; but a surprising number of parts, including the airbox and cables, the steering column, the drivetrain, are all direct or modified parts from the 128. Japanese rust problems are designed in the cars are only meant to last 6-7 years and were poorly protected in the factory. The lovable numbskulls of Verplanck, New York, are all beside themselves with shock and quiet joy when town bully Mona Dearly dies in a freak accident involving her Yugo, some cut brake lines, and a plunge into the Hudson. Do not sell my data Also, familiarity is important in servicing a car.Lots of American mechanics wouldnt bother to learn the finer points of working on Yugos because there were so few of them and parts were slow to arrive when needed. Second factor was, the popularity in the day of recycled steel in car manufacture. Some Japanese automakers seem to have been surprisingly resistant to the latter; that was a major complaint of Yutaka Katayama at Nissan. First of all, thanks to Perry Shoar for a very well written explanation of the events of the 70s and 80s that led to the meltdown of Yugoslavia. Bricklin was kicked out in the first (of two) bankruptcies, true. . Last Update: . There was a guy that was racing a Yugo in SCCA competition, but thats been a long time ago. My problem was that I didn't care who killed Mona Dearly, or why, and didn't want to know anyone in town except for Chief Rash and his daughter. if (window['UnicI'] && window['UnicI'].geo && window['UnicI'].geo !== '-' ) { I attach a picture of a 1100,the previous model,(5 door too! It would take about eight years from apparent problem to engineered fix to failure of the fix and another engineered solution. . Money was a problem; but not the root problem. Theres a fellow in the NorCal chapter of The Fiat Club first names Dan, I think who owns a pristine Yugo in a burnt orange color. Pictures provided by: garco, antp, ahight, Display options: Display as images Display as list Jason Vuic details this in his book The Yugo of how management refused plans for premiums for top-grade work or extra effort; of how primitive and shoddy were the paint booths, of how design goofs went uncorrected for years. Technically if its going downhill it wasnt moving on its own power. How do explanations of Zastavas lack of quality control compare to, say, one which could be made to illustrate the reasons of Audis numerous failures? Only with the threat of armed intervention by Nato and the UN is an uneasy peace maintained. I had always known these to be license-built versions of the 128. console.log(window['UnicI'].geo); Someone wanted her dead. Thank you for the history, it complements the story of the car well. The car itself rattled and shook upon starting. Amidst mutual finger pointing, the deal collapsed in July 2008 as the erstwhile partners took turns suing one another in federal court. I really dont think that anyone has a competitive advantage in rust resistance any more. It couldnt be trusted just sitting in the parking lot. It would be interesting to see how the rear suspension was beefed up. I was discussing cars with a woman in my office building one day, when she remarked that she had owned a Yugo, and got an incredible number of miles out of it. Audis have been headaches to owners at various times. I would suggest you read Jason Vuics book on the Yugowhat he described the Yugo America advance men as finding, had little to do with shortages of raw materials. As my old profesor of economics said: War is the best economic valve Unfortunately, Ive learned that from personal experience. One of the sight gags is that everyone in town drives a Yugo, thereby using personalized license plates as a necessity more than anything else.) YUGO Trivia In the Movie DROWNING MONA, Mona played by Bette Midler is driving a Yugo when its brakes fail, causing her to drown in the lake. setTimeout(waitGEO, 200); This was almost $1100 lower than the cheapest Chevy Sprint and lower than even the Hyundai Excel. lol, Yugos were marketed in USA 1985 to 1990 by Malcolm Bricklin's vehicle imports Firm. Needless to say, it wouldve been better if Bently had just gone ahead and let them have the Mulsanne. I had very good support for the Yugo as Atlanta is the home of Bayless, which is a big Fiat parts house. Big deal, huh? An older Yugo, since the car hasn't been manufactured since its country went out of business. Here in Greece they are still around and not that rare. I want to say she drove it, but I dont think she actually put many miles on it. There are like 100 YUGOs in the movie, which I think came out around 1998. Chief Wyatt Rash: My mother always used to say, "When life hands you potatoes, make potato salad!". Based on the slightly larger Fiat 125, it was everything bad about a lada, but somehow worse. With no new product in the pipeline, Bricklin would either have to find another car to flog or get an honest job, so there was a mutual meshing of interests when he arranged a visit to the Red Banner Factory in Yugoslavia that turned out the new apple of his eye in 1984. All in all, Monas jaunt into the river could have been described as a pretty fortuitous accident for everyones lives she touched, or in Monas case, bludgeoned. The movie was directed by Nick Gomez, who, in "Laws of Gravity" and "New Jersey Drive," brought a John Cassavetes touch to working-class crime and confusion. Id actually like to have another one, but beef it up with Fiat parts. Maybe Bricklin had caught lightning in a bottle. There are heaps of suspects ranging from her husband, her son, her son's friend, her son's friend's fiance and so on. Install shift knob on replacement car. Drowning Mona is a 2000 U.S. crime comedy starring Danny DeVito as Wyatt Rash, a local police chief from Verplanck, New York, who investigates the mysterious death of Mona Dearly (played by Bette Midler), a spiteful, loud-mouthed, cruel and around the town highly unpopular woman, who drove her son's Yugo off the . There was a dealer in Denver Colorado, called Apple Motors, who used to sell warmed up Yugos. (not that I cared that much about it I was in my mid-twenties and during summer season beaches were full of naked girls.) Introduced at an offer price of just under $1300 , the little Subaru made much of its over 60 MPG fuel economy and low cost of ownership. As I said earlier, this car obviously didnt meet the expectations of the majority of the American masses, but I know you werent the only one who found the Yugo a simple and easy-to-work-on car. Show more Yugo America. Ive been toying with seeing if I can find one thats been stored in a garage somewhere and buying it to replace my aging truck that leaks oil and coolant and tide the time before I can buy the new Fiat 500. I owned one. And this works both ways after war ended in ex. But before Bricklin made a virtue of safety, he all but made a mockery of same just a half decade before. I also have to say that state ownership does not always lead to poor business. I've owned so many other cars so why not? But, I decided that going back into the printing business made more sense to me, so I left the car lot and headed back to what I call work. It was only later, when the bean-counters bid out the belts on a cost basis, that they developed a much shorter lifespan. Which together would have theoretically allowed the Yugo to be more successful. Our Mr. Bricklin also had an idea to start up another company fed by Zastava, this time to be called ZMW. The car she is driving is a Yugo, and the pic's locale is Verplanck, New York (north of New York City), that actually was a test market for the ill-fated economy car in the late 1970's. . A Mitsubishi in all but name, Proton wisely didnt fiddle around with it much meaning you got a reliable Pseudo-Japanese car for your money, not a cobbled together lash up like the yugo was. Danny DeVito and Bette Midler appeared in Ruthless People (1986). That salty New England slush had its way with everything. To say that the 360 was unsuited to American driving norms is to wildly overpraise the car. } And incompetence does not negate the political reasons, until and unless the failure of management becomes an unavoidable political embarrassment. A lot of Wehrmacht occupation troops went home in tiny little pieces because Zastava knew what they were doing. I had been driving a Datsun 200 SX and the 5 speed was like silk. Drowning Mona 2000 (PG-13)Strident comedy about the low-IQ denizens of small town Verplanck, New York, where everybody still drives a Yugo (the town was a test market). Mona Dearly (Bette Midler) is an anagram for "only a dream". Of course, not wanting to be associated with alleged members of the alleged Romanian Mafia, Bently pulled out. But the acquisition by Fiat in 2010 renders all of that as ancient history. Which, actually, was a very good little car . Just like the Russian Lada its simple and DIY friendly as long as you relise that and dont expect a Lexus. The best part was they all had the same license plates on them to just have a semblance of legality! 2. (At the same dealership on the window sticker above,actually). When I got there, my promised job had fallen through and my wife and child still needed a car, and I needed one for working. Not too long before I sold it, it had started to develop noisy CV joints, but by then the car was 8 years old and 100,000 miles. First, salt as a melting agent on roads was relatively new. Casey Affleck wore a blonde wig for this film. I know of a 1979 Datsun pickup that completly rusted out in 6 years. During lunch the high schoolers came out and lifted it up so the front tires were up on the sidewalk. I was scarred for her to be driving it. Bowfinger - The main character produced a documentary called The Yugo Story. I bought a used, year-old Yugo. Kei cars still exist, but the engine size and dimensional standards have been increased somewhat, and the newer Kei cars tend to be very tall, boxy affairs to create the maximum possible cubic footage of interior room within the package limits. Its a Plymouth Horizon which,I guess,is the same as a Talbot Horizon. The characters this time could be lightened up and dumbed-down versions of the confused drunks in "Laws of Gravity," their social lives centered on bars, their center of gravity the bartender. In the small, white-trash town of Verplanck, N.Y., a loathsome woman named Mona Dearly (a dour and ugly Bette Midler) drives her car over a cliff and into the river. Honestly, I think Zastava should be commended for the amount of engineering they were able to do independently, modifying and developing Fiat cars. But that's a whole other story.") Seem like this article is just a mishmash of old articles written by people who never owned a Yugo, dont know anything about yugos, or who designed its engine. The Tipo 145 was developed in the early 1970s (IIRC), and it showed. This is all fictional of course. a special for the movie,an extended version,or just my failing memory? No parts fell off of it, the car generally was in good condition (other than some stains on the seats that I didnt care to speculate about). The problems experienced with Yugos, were unknown to new-car buyers in that era; were entirely avoidable with better assembly and simple correction of design and process mistakes; and were connected to durability related to poor design or engineering. Too many people in this country have this mentality that if its cheap, treat it as such and yes, a fulfilled prophesy. Hell, he only paid something like $500 for a beater commuter car and this was in the late 1990s. Worse, it was not just fenders and rocker panels that looked bad but did not affect the way the car drove. I knew a guy in the 90s, who was very smart (the grandson of a Nobel Prize winner in fact!) I remember listening to Car Talk some 5-6 years ago and a caller came on and said that his Yugo (an 87 I think) died at 150,000 miles, not due to mechanical failure, but due to a Deer. This car had one genuine asset: ride quality. With the pullout of Fiat, Renault and the British makes just a few years before, there was a general sense that room existed in the market for any european nameplate that could build a reasonably priced car that returned good fuel economy and high build quality. Secondly, I would be one of those people who had a good experience with a Yugo. In the 70s when I lived in Boston, I worked with a guy whose 5-year-old Pinto had big holes in the doors. Whats good- quad headlights Ah, the quintessential crap car. Now Rash has to decide who killed Mona Dearly. A girl I knew in high school had one of these, it got rustier seemingly by the day, and this was in 1991-2 so it wasnt by any means an old car. I think it's worth keeping them separate because it's a in-joke of the film that almost everyone has a Yugo. Finallywith a new clutch 400 miles oldit tossed the alternator belt. As for the FloridaBricklin was itching to bring it in. Early oil changes, followed maintenance schedule. View Cars. Drowning Mona is basically a comic murder-mystery. Screenwriter Peter Steinfeld says the film was originally going to be set in a mythical north. I sold the car to a coworker of my BILs, who drove the car another three years before he totaled it. if (!readyGEO) { It is difficult to overstate how rustprone 1970s Japaneese cars were. Sales quickly slowed when word of the myriad problems began to circulate in the media. couple of months ago when I was in Athens. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism. In my Country was make an attempt to import the Yugo Cabrio,rebadged as Innocenti Koral Cabrio,but homologation fiche wasn't approved for Italy,but if car was tested by Italian motor magazines(Italy will import Yugos twice,1986 to 1987 with origin name Zastava Yugo and 1990 to 1992 as Innocenti Koral 45 and 55--that rebadged for our Country), I like this movie. My best friend had for a brief time, a rusted 1980 Civic DX hatchback that ultimately blew out its 2 upper gears in the 5spd manual tranny that did it in even though his mechanic could not get the bolts out to replace the clutch due to rust. No tinted glass or glove compartment. Old joke. Zastava only collapsed in 2008, and its decline was NOT due to mismanagement, but the trade embargo on Serbia, which starved them of devlopment funds. She was rather negligent about maintenance, so would have been tough on any vehicle, but her Yugo, like many of its kind, fell apart rather quickly, stressing a budget that was already tight. To see mine riding on a tow truck was so humiliating. View 9 images This doomed script and conventional direction venture for Nick Gomez (" New Jersey Drive "/" Laws of Gravity "), results in a comedy that got by with a few mean-spirited jokes. Parts were cheap due to the exchange rate, so there was not the pressure on dealers to deny problems and warranty claims, like Ford and Vauxhall put on their dealers. During WWII, they built a few Jeeps. This may seem shocking, but Yugos really dont rust badly. The local news interveiwed some and they were going for $4000 Id end up with used junk, but now I got a new import!. I was enrolled in a community class marketing course and the teacher brought up the Yugo, and was joking about it. That explains why everyone was driving them then. The place where I used to work was given a Yugo 45. I guess this is so the company could find out how the car is before releasing it to the general public. I actually grew to like winding the snot out of that motor. Another movie moment: Nick drives a Yugo in the film _Nick & Norahs Infinite Playlist_. The civil war in the former Yugoslavia was the finishing blow, but wasnt the reason it wasnt brought over. Saying that, it doesnt mean that people were particularly promiscuitive or anything like that. But back to the subject, shortage of all kind of raw material was the main reason for poor quality, not drunken workers. As the movie opens, a local woman named Mona Dearly (Bette Midler) speeds down a country road and directly into the Hudson River when her brakes fail. The man is Malcom Bricklin. Membership also saw a similarly sharp increase, with over 1,800,000 in the same year (300,000 more than in 1970). 3) The Yugo has a good reputation in the land of its birth. I was listening one Saturday to Car Talk and one of the callers that day to the show was a Catholic priest who drove a Yugo and commented on all the flak he received for his choice of automotive transportation. Its not unlike the relationship I have with my cockroaches of the road (TM). [SOUNDBITE - clip from Drowning Mona trailer, 2000] Every car in the movie, save for the police vehicle and a main character's landscaping pickup, is a . Everyone in Verplanck, N.Y., drives a Yugo. In 1969, Subaru started producing a larger, much more traditional (well, mostly) car, the 1000. He got two large import operations going and he launched the SV-1. Source for information on Drowning Mona: VideoHound's Golden Movie . Before we wrap, lets sort them out. Here, it is well known that you change the timing belt every 40K miles. Mona, played by Midler, drowns when the brakes in her Yugo fail and she catapults through a guardrail into the lake below. Say what you will about Bricklin he is a man of action. Ladas were, and are, shite. Wyatt finds no shortage of suspects. They did not have such a bad reputation,at least not as bad as the rear engined Skodas Joe Friday (Dan Aykroyd) had a gold one in the Dragnet movie. Film Focus: Drowning Mona. English tongues tended to read it JUG-oh not a saleable name. Rated PG-13 document.getElementById("unic-ccpa").style.display = 'inline'; Had Bricklin given the tooling to the Koreans, and had it built to their standards under contracthed have had what he wanted. The Italian Government and the Unions forced Fiat to cooperate. In Spain it was called "Todos la queran muerta" (everyone wanted her dead), Too good of a movie not to be on this site in HD. Especially on economy cars- Yugos often sold to High School girls, who would just turn up the stereo when their failure to add oil led to rod knocking. At only 20,000 miles it was worn out, fading, under powered, rusting, it wanted to die and be buried, it certainly didnt want to be a car! Lack of an automatic would hamper the car during all but the final year in the states. i doubt they are still there. It broke down like a Yugo. As the pride of Serbo-Croatia hit the streets of America, reports of slipshod assembly began flooding back to the companys Upper Saddle River , New Jersey headquarters. Not sure they sold very many. It WAS a simple-to-work-on car; and in that regard I appreciated it. "Drowning Mona" is a frustrating comedy. At our Year 2000 track day at Lime Rock, one of the entries was a race-prepared Yugo. LIkewise, Yugo UK supported its dealers well. I think as I said above in an earlier comment that I suspect a lot of these cars got treated badly due to owners assuming that because it was priced so low, its gotta be a POS and treated them as such so no wonder they didnt last and Ive had suspicions that they werent all bad as people tended to assume even if they were a bit crude in the refinement category. if(document.getElementById("unic-gdpr")) { Mine was 5 years old and had like 40K miles on it. Jeff might have wanted to kill her. Childrens toys are more dependable. I think youre a bit dismissive of Zastava. The "Fetzer valve", when Lucinda the mechanic is giving the Sheriff her findings about Mona's car, she says the "Fetzer valve" had been punctured. As the movie opens, a local woman named Mona Dearly ( Bette Midler) speeds down a country road and directly into the Hudson River when her brakes fail. Thanks for your detailed experience. Notify me of follow-up comments by email. If possible, the FSO 125p was even worse. I know of no explanation for the garbage experience my dad had with his Audi, which broke down regularly. Jamie Lee Curtis' character looks like she has some colorful insights to share but isn't given the dialogue to do it--she's more a plot marker than a person. But these Yugos aren't just a frivolous component of the storythey're essential to establishing the wacky tone of the film. There was a movie in 2000 entitled Drowning Mona where most of the people in a . Sure some of the plastic trim was suspect, but dont forget that GM was still doing rubbermaid doors then, and the Japanese were still stapling vinyl over cardboard for door trims. From the start, Zastava resented the profit dealers made, and thought their expenses exorbitant. Found it! Sales ended in the U.S. that year when a recall was ordered by the feds over emissions issues related to faulty carburetors. Bricklins old nemesis Consumer Reports weighed in on the cars many shortcomings in its February 1986 issue and refused to recommend it at any price. Casey Affleck has gone on record saying that both this film and Soul Survivors (2001) were his two least favorite films that he has worked on. Our narrative today is of a modern P.T. Had the car been screwed together properly, and had there been an engineering department to iron out the bugs, it could have had a long run. Beads of sweat formed on his forehead, it wasnt that he didnt want to learn, it was where he was sitting that had him scarred. The car is the Yugo. After Mona Dearly (Bette Milder) dies in the movie's opening moments when her Yugo plows through a guardrail and into the Hudson River far below, Wyatt begins investigating her death. The problem here was, first, poor management, as I noted; second, a workplace culture and a national culture that was absolute authoritarianism. })(); Pictures are property of movie companies owner of the respective movies. Drowning Mona | 2000 | PG-13 | - 5.5.5. 500 Yugo cabrio were imported to the States. Or maybe not. The real reason why Crvena Zastava went into this adventure was that they were desperate to get some foreign currency to keep assembly lines alive. And management, often put there through politics, has little interest in learning of customer dissatisfaction. Second occurred during 1994-95, having changed employment by then, while driving the 50+ miles each morning, Id notice Yugos of different colors pass me on the four lane driven by the same fellow. And the gas cap would not come off. Her brake lines had been cut. You had to know FIATS and and what Yugo klooged up to meet EPA regs and how to unklooge it. While poor Yugo certainly was not the best car made, but it was hardly the worst either. Cool Cruise CAR SHOW Cruisin' Brea CAR SHOW Cruisin' La Verne CAR SHOW Brea Holiday CAR SHOW Project Home America Flying Deuces is a production, marketing, booking and advertising company. Rona Mace (Jamie Lee Curtis) is an anagram for "a romance". Actually, Perry did a much better job of it than I could have. (function waitGEO() { In the 1970s the PCI (Italian Communist Party) reached its all-time maximum electorally: 34.4% in the 1976 general election (12,600,000 votes, 3 million more than in the previous election in 1972). When the Yugo GV was finally offered for sale in September 1985, (as an 86 model) , initial orders looked promising. So on the line, a worker would have to cut and install and tape it, with about a 25 percent failure rateincorrectly re-connected.

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drowning mona yugo cars