None With a Bullitt

Peter Yates, director of the best car chase not involving the Blues Brothers or the General Lee, has died at the age of 81. Although Steve McQueen didn’t pull double duty as both pursuer and pursuee as he did in the motorcycle chase at the end of The Great Escape, Yates did put one of cinema’s best drivers to work behind the wheel of a Ford Mustang pursing a Dodge Charger through the streets of San Francisco. Yates was nominated for Academy Awards for directing Breaking Away and The Dresser, both tragically car-chase free. Other films included The Deep featuring Jacqueline Bisset in a wet t-shirt and… some other stuff, and Krull, a sci-fi film that can be shown with reels out of order to no detrimental effect.