About The Movie -

The year is 1948, the place is Los Angeles, and Ezekiel "Easy" Rawlins (Denzel Washington) is a black man who has just lost his job and is in dire need of money. So, despite having no experience as a private eye, Easy accepts an assignment from a seedy man (Tom Sizemore) to find the missing Daphne Monet (Jennifer Beals), the mistress of a powerful mayoral candidate.

The Fifth Avenue Connection -

There were actually two 1946 Pontiacs used in the movie, the nice one Denzel drove during most of the movie, and the ugly one they shot the back window out of, during the movie. Fifth Avenue's 6-volt alternators were installed on both cars. In addition, Randy also converted the old toe board foot starter to a more modern solenoid type and included a hidden Ford type pushbutton for under the dash. Denzel had a little trouble learning how to control the foot starter gas pedal and clutch pedal all at the same time.

On behalf of the lighting crew and various extras, the upgrade was very much appreciated! Watching Denzel start his car in the movie and you will know he is not using the original foot starter, Also in some of the night time scenes the headlights on the cars were actually too bright so they tinted the headlight lenses using green window tint. If you watch closely you can see the green colored headlights. That has to be a first for a 6-volt car in the movies…to have headlights that are too bright.

Also the car that had the back window shot out actually had no interior and a really poor paint job, if you watch closely you can see it. The scene was shot in the dark and your focus was on the actors anyway….at least that was the plan. A few years after the movie came out both of the 1946 Pontiacs cars used in the movie were sold at public auction by the movie studio.