Some became famous. Others appeared for a few minutes, did their job, and quietly disappeared.
The 1965 Apollo GT belongs in the second group.
Most people have seen an Apollo GT, even if they couldn’t tell you its name. In Disney’s 1968 film The Love Bug, Peter Thorndyke—played with proper British arrogance by David Tomlinson—drives a bright yellow Apollo GT wearing number 14. It is low, sleek, expensive-looking, and clearly cast as the serious racing machine opposite Herbie, the little Volkswagen Beetle with a mind of its own.
Then it gets beaten by the Bug.
That may not sound like the best way to secure a place in automotive history, but Hollywood works in strange ways. Lose a race in the right movie and millions of people will remember your car for the next 60 years.
The Apollo GT was far more interesting than its supporting role suggested. Built by International Motorcars in Oakland, California, it was one of the most ambitious American sports cars of its era. The idea was simple enough: combine Italian styling with dependable American power and create a grand touring car capable of running with Europe’s best.
Simple idea. Very difficult business.
The Apollo’s body came from Intermeccanica, giving the car the long hood, low roofline, and carefully balanced proportions expected from a proper Italian GT. It looked expensive because it was designed to look expensive. There were hints of Ferrari and Maserati in the shape, but the Apollo had its own identity. It was clean, restrained, and free from the unnecessary decoration Detroit was still using to sell cars a few years earlier.
Under the hood sat Buick’s lightweight 215-cubic-inch aluminum V8. That engine was an inspired choice. It was compact, relatively light, and delivered the kind of torque that made the Apollo easier to drive than many temperamental European exotics. You had Italian bodywork without needing a personal mechanic named Giuseppe living in your guesthouse.
The combination gave the Apollo genuine performance. It had the appearance of a European thoroughbred, the sound of an American V8, and enough speed to back up the shape. In another universe, International Motorcars might have become a serious American competitor to Ferrari, Aston Martin, and Maserati.
In this universe, building low-volume sports cars is a fine way to turn a large pile of money into a small pile of unpaid invoices.
Production remained extremely limited. Approximately 88 Apollo cars were built, depending on how unfinished chassis and later variations are counted. That makes the Apollo considerably rarer than many cars carrying far larger prices today. Scarcity alone, however, doesn’t make a car important. The Apollo matters because it represents one of those rare moments when American engineering and Italian coachbuilding came together without one side overpowering the other.
Then came The Love Bug.
The Apollo was a perfect choice for Thorndyke. He needed a car that looked sophisticated, fast, and slightly menacing beside Herbie. A Corvette would have been too familiar. A Ferrari might have stolen attention from the story. The Apollo looked exotic enough to establish Thorndyke as a serious competitor, yet unfamiliar enough for the audience to accept it as something special.
The joke worked because the Apollo looked like it should destroy a Volkswagen Beetle. Herbie defeating it was the mechanical equivalent of a bar fight where the smallest guy in the room knocks out the heavyweight champion.
The original yellow movie car survived and was eventually restored in its familiar racing livery, complete with the number 14 on its doors. Today, it carries two separate identities. It is an extremely rare Apollo GT, built during one of the most adventurous periods in American sports-car history. It is also Thorndyke’s car from one of Disney’s best-known automotive films.
That screen appearance may have saved the Apollo from becoming a footnote.
Plenty of faster cars were built in the 1960s. Plenty were produced in greater numbers and won more important races. Very few, however, can claim to have shared the screen with a Volkswagen, suffered complete humiliation, and emerged decades later as the machine serious car people want to know about.
The Apollo GT lost to Herbie.
In the long run, it won something better: it became unforgettable.
Reference: PowerTube TV.
