Television and movies showing old-style car telephones
Geoff Fors (internal link) checks in with quick comments on television and movies showing old-style car telephones: Click on this link for more information on pre-cellular phones. (internal link)
Tom: I wonder how many movies and TV shows feature vintage mobile phones.
"Sabrina" with Humphrey Bogart -- Prop/totally fake lowband MTS phone, in fact two of them side by side in his limo with an antenna which looked like it belonged on a tank in Iraq.
Mannix -- had a white MJ series head in his Mercury (?) convertible operated in the MTS mode. Seemed to be accurate in portrayal.
Cannon -- Had an RCC or Radio Common Carrier, (not Bell) head in his Lincoln, seem to recall his using MTS format when making calls.
Hawaii 5-0 -- Wo Fat, Chinese agent, used a Motorola MJ phone on board a yacht while holding a kidnapped child for ransom. McGarrett traced him through the ship to shore operator, curious because the MJ is a Bell car phone.
Earthquake (movie) -- Charlton Heston's K-5 Blazer has a lowband antenna and a GE Progress Line DTO series MTS head mounted on the dash. Early scenes show the head and Heston making calls. TV versions are edited and the scene has been cut out (drat...)
Superman serial (B&W 1953 era version) -- Perry White has a MTS phone in his car. A real one, not a prop, labeled "Mobile Radio Telephone, West Coast Electronics." I have one in my collection, minus the head and cables.
Banacek -- Had a fake mobile phone in his Packard and also the limo. Limo prop was usually a Trimline princess style. Later limo phones were black MJ heads and accurate.
Jerry Lewis movie (title forgotten, about a little girl and her chauffer (Jerry) --The Rolls Silver Cloud limo has a VHF highband MTS phone with rear seat extension head above the rear seat, appears to be the rare ITT KH- series MTS phone.
Live and Let Die -- James Bond--starting scene has CIA driver taking Bond into NYC in a Chevrolet sedan which has a Motorola "MTS" pre-MJ head, which the driver uses to answer a call, as I remember. Driver is shot enroute and the car wrecked, but the head no doubt escaped unscathed.
Twilight Zone -- (1966)--Blackmailer driving a 1966 Chrysler Imperial sedan uses a black MJ control head to receive calls from victim.
Ironside -- Had an MJ head in his second generation van. His first generation truck seems to be parked in various Monterey locations with a load of parking tickets plastered to it and a chicken coop built into the rear.
That leaves a bunch of other movies whose titles I can't recall, including some Doris day films with just handsets showing, other films with briefcase phones, and so on and so on . . .
Geoff