Duelling With The Long Arm Of The Law

The police are an often inspiring bunch. No, not The Police. We’re talking about the men and women who risk their lives every day to keep us safe. The only problem is, well, sometimes they get cooler cars to drive than we do! From the Porsche 356-driving German Polizei to a very special Ferrari gifted to officers in Rome, this week’s playlist features many of the amazing vehicles driven by police around the world.

With incredible footage of the German police, the British documentary series A Look At Life produced this film in the ’60s, and provided a stunning look at both how casual policing looked back in the day, as well as the Porsche 356s that the German police got to drive around in!

You’ll have to wait about a minute through a nonsensical opening scene, but pretty quickly you’ll see a then-new Tatra T630 hauling down a motorway. Made as a promotional film for Tatra, we’re not sure how outrunning the police on film was very useful to customers, but the result is cheery, fun, and footage of a car rare in museums—let alone on YouTube.

In 1962, crime in Rome was remarkably under control thanks to the valiant efforts of the local police. To reward the success of the force, the president of the Italian Republic himself asked Enzo Ferrari to assign two very special Ferraris to police duty. One of the Ferraris is almost immediately destroyed. One survives to this day. This is the tale of the survivor.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vyTNJGPNfc

Use your vehicle as a weapon? As this 1976 film shows, sometimes people need to understand how to get out of sticky situations. It’s like every old car chase, redone as an instructional video—”Drive straight through, like a Karate kick!” the narrator says.

The Carabinieri are Italy’s national military police force and have played an instrumental part in Italy’s history, including helping bring down Mussolini during World War II. What makes them even more badass is that not only do they get to wear chic uniforms and drive Alfa Romeos, but in the ’60s and ’70s they were the protagonists in many real-life car chases pursuing notorious criminals like Vallanzasca and Red Brigade terrorists.

We can only imagine how many fruit carts were turned over during these pursuits.Watch two veteran Carabinieri wax nostalgic about these hot pursuits in their Alfa Romeo Giulias. 

Vintage police equipment on the left, and on the right, a training video produced for the San Diego Police…of the ’40s. Quaint? Absolutely.