Woodyanders Irascible LAPD captain Gibbs (a amiable and dynamic portrayal by country singer Hoyt Axton) goes after master thief Maindrian Pace (writer/director H.B. Halicki) after Pace steals a car belonging to his obnoxious son-in-law Carl (a lively and amusing performance by Dan Grimaldi). Moreover, a South African drug lord pays Price and his crew to boost 48 cars for him. Halicki keeps the flimsy, but still enjoyable story zipping along at a constant brisk pace, maintains an engaging lighthearted tone throughout, and stages the copious rousing car chases and fender-bending vehicular carnage with rip-roaring aplomb. The last thirty minute extended car chase in particular is simply spectacular, with more than enough burnt rubber and mangled metal on hand to satisfy aficionados of this sort of stuff. Sure, the bulk of this flick is recycled footage from "Gone in 60 Seconds," but it's still a total blast just the same.

MrMuscleHead What a rip-off! Deadline Auto Theft is actually the original Gone in 60 Seconds with some very minor editing. It is well established that Gone in 60 Seconds 2 is unfinished and this shows the stunt sequences that would have been in that film. That amounts to about 33 minutes of car chases with no storyline to speak of. If you've seen the original Gone in 60 Seconds, acquiring this film will be an extraordinary waste of time unless for some reason you insist on seeing the complete Halicki body of work, in which case, the special features are quite nice. Everyone else should rent this, or the original Gone in 60 Seconds, not both.

michael-mccarroll This movie is essentially identical to his original Gone in 60 Seconds. Most of the car and chase scenes are identical. Actually, I don't recall any being different. The Dodge Challenger scene is there, the garage showing all the cars, as well as, the several encounters with Eleanor. Only a few of the dialog sequences are changed. Halicki I believe did this because he didn't like the original plot. The changes add more law scenes. Primarily a loud talking sheriff who constantly demands that the need to find the culprit. I rated this low not really because of the virtual similarity to the original. Really, it's not that bad. I actually rated the original a 7 or 8. There's just no reason to buy both versions in my opinion. However, there is a DVD version that contains both this, as well as, Gone in 60 Seconds 2: Junkman. If you have to have it, I would recommend buying this DVD as it would save you a few bucks.

Paul Morris Or so touts the original trailer for the film. In director H.B. Halicki's previous movie, "The Junkman", Christopher Stone says he was "not excited" by the first three minutes of "Gone in 60 Seconds", and is thus doing reshoots. Here we have the result. "Gone in 60 Seconds" has been ripped apart, a lot of old stuff thrown away and new scenes inserted, including an entire new opening, parts of which can be seen in "The Junkman".The new opening and additional scenes are actually really good. However, they pretty-much have nothing to do with the rest of the film. Well, they do, but not in a way that if you got rid of them and just kept the old "Gone in 60 Seconds", it would make a difference. Hoyt Axton steals the show, but unfortunately disappears towards the end. His daughter's fiancé's car is stolen at the start, and we get numerous "hell-bent" speeches on how he is determined to catch master thief Maindrian Pace, but come the big pursuit at the end, he is nowhere to be found, apart from a couple of quick scenes in a helicopter, and when he saves the day for the hapless car wash manager who is wrongly accused.I guess the only thing to really discuss are the new scenes. For those who have seen the original "Gone in 60 Seconds", everything is still there, apart from a lot of shaved footage. The new Queen Mary chase at the start is very entertaining, but unfortunately the detectives in the pursuit are portrayed as goofy and stupid, much to the cliché. In "Gone in 60 Seconds" and "The Junkman", the police certainly crashed during chases, but the crashes were believable and real. In "Deadline Auto Theft", they seem to crash just for the sake of action, and most of the crashes are stupid and corny. Three cars in a row flying over an embankment and into boats to avoid a stationary Kombi? Not to mention the ridiculous "shortcut" taken by two cops in the LA riverbed, where they end up stalled over the drainage channel and have another unmarked car hit them and overturn. It was wonderful to see Sgt. Hawkins from "Gone in 60 Seconds" back and involved in the new scenes. However, where he was a hard-ass cop in that film, his new scenes here portray him as just as goofy and stupid as the rest. I was unhappy to see him uncredited yet again, and would love to know who played him. A great actor!"Deadline Auto Theft" is certainly worth a look. Hell, I really enjoyed it. There is one glaring problem, though, and that is that the new scenes were filmed in 1982, while "Gone in 60 Seconds" came out in 1974. So fashions and vehicles are completely different, and one would wonder why the hell Maindrian and pals dress like fools and the Long Beach PD drive 1968 Plymouth Belvederes, when at the start everything is post 1976. Try to ignore that and you'll be fine!