On an August morning in 1978, French director Claude Lelouch mounted a gyro-stabilized camera to the bumper of a Ferrari 275 GTB and had a friend, a professional Formula 1 racer, drive at breakneck speed through the heart of Paris.

The film was limited for technical reasons to 10 minutes. The driver barrel-assed all the way from Porte Dauphine (on the city's western edge, adjacent to the Bois de Bologne) to the Basilica Sacre Coeur in Montmartre.

No streets were closed, for Lelouch was unable to obtain a permit. The driver completed the course in about 9 minutes, reaching nearly 140 mph in some stretches. The footage reveals him running real red lights, nearly hitting real pedestrians, and driving the wrong way up several one-way streets.

Upon showing the film in public for the first time, Lelouch was arrested. He has never revealed the identity of the driver, and the film went underground until a DVD release a few years ago.

Few things in the world sound as wonderful as a Ferrari engine. The End!

The film shows an eight-minute drive through Paris in the early hours of the morning (05:30hrs), accompanied by sounds of a high-reving engine, gear changes and squealing tires. It starts in a tunnel of the Paris Périphérique at Porte Dauphine, with an onboard view from an unseen car exiting up on a ramp to Avenue Foch. Well-known landmarks such as the Arc de Triomphe, Opéra Garnier, and Place de la Concorde with its obelisk are passed, as well as the Champs-Élysées. Pedestrians are passed, pigeons sitting on the streets are scattered, red lights are ignored, one-way streets are driven up the wrong way, centre lines are crossed, the car runs on a pavement to avoid a refuse lorry.