Occasionally, there will be something from pop culture that influences trends in what people do to their cars, but it’s not common. Usually when it happens the pop culture in question is tied pretty directly to automotive culture in some way, like how the Fast and Furious movies made people install 20-gear transmissions in their cars. Rarely, though, there will be a non-car-focused movie that spawns trends in car customization to the point where aftermarket companies are selling parts just to fulfill the demand spawned by the movie. And when I say “rarely,” I mean I can only think of one pop cultural thing that fits this category, the 1972 blaxploitation film Super Fly.
Yes, Superfly. It’s very much a blaxploitation film, and likely doesn’t really portray the best archetypes of characters, especially to modern eyes, but mostly I just want you to see the hero car in the film, which is featured pretty prominently in the trailer:
See that thing? It’s a car that’s based on a 1971 Cadillac Fleetwood Eldorado, modified by a company called Dunham Coach. That distinctive, over-the-top, chrome-slathered, pimped-out look is largely the creation of Les Dunham, at least according to him, in this video, which also lets us know that he made the Corvorado (a Corvette/Eldorado hybrid):
All of the exuberant and flashy bits bolted onto these Superfly cars, the oversized grille caps, those genuinely bonkers massive three-bar faux headlight things that fit over the existing quad sealed-beam headlamps like Sally Jessy Raphael’s spectacles, all of this Superfly crazy chrome candy was made available to the common, Normalfly people thanks to the magic of the JC Whitney catalog (I went a bit into the history of the catalog in this post).
Thanks to our own social media guy Peter, who sent me an old 1974 catalog, I can show you exactly how you could Superfly your own ride, in the comfort of your own driveway or lawn. Just look at all these Superfly options you could have:
Holy crap, that’s a lot of options! Can one car support this much superlative fly? I have no idea, but I suspect many, many people pushed those limits to see what was possible. Let’s look at some of these options in detail:
Why should Lincoln Continentals have all the fun of pretending to house a spare tire upright in the back of a trunk and not you? They shouldn’t, which is why you should be thrilled that you could get a Continental-style trunk lid for a huge variety of American cars, including the Mustang II! It’s also perfect if you haul a lot of tall, round items in your trunk, like cable spools or huge pizzas, stacked vertically like books on a shelf.
Grilles are a big deal, visually, and go a long way to defining the face of a car. So, if you found that even 1970s exuberance wasn’t enough to satisfy your exhibitionistic grille demands, JC Whitney had your back. If you felt your grille was close, but just needed a little bit of goosing, you could get a Grille Crown that you just popped atop your existing grille, like a little chrome hat.
At about $55 in 1972, these would be about $385 today. That’s not that cheap!
I like how the copy for these things says:
“Even if you can’t afford a Rolls or a Lincoln Mark IV, you can own a car with a grille that looks every bit as prestigious.”
I’m sure this was absolutely true, and valets would be thrilled to park your Mustang II out front, right next to the Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow that is quite clearly your car’s peer.
If a grille crown wasn’t enough, there were full grille replacement options, too:
Some of these were in separate parts you had to assemble around your old grille, some replaced the grille outright, but all gave your car the gravitas and presence of a machine that pushed around a chrome model of the Parthenon on its face.
These Superfly Headlights are probably the most distinctive and noticeable bolt-on your could add to your car to really lean hard into this look. Designed to evoke the massive headlamps of cars like 1920s and 1930s Rolls-Royces, with their tri-bar internal supports and gargantuan size, these units fit over two sealed beam lights per side and extended up and above the car’s hoodline, to give the illusion of being separate lamps.
I think these light covers give the car a strange, myopic look, but who cares? These things definitely can’t be ignored. 
Landau bars are strange things in automotive design. They started out as literal, functional hinges for convertible tops, and then somehow became so synonymous with wealth and class that they’re now an expected part of a hearse, a vehicle about as unlikely to be a convertible as anything I can think of:
In 1972, though, they definitely suggested classy, with a capital “assy.” So I’m not surprised JC Whitney offered four different stick-on landau bar options. They make as much sense on the C-pillar of a coupé as they do on a hearse, so why not live a little?
Speaking of C-pillars on coupés, this period was definitely the Golden Age of the Opera Window. Opera windows were strange little portholes in the C-pillars, I suppose offering more sensual privacy for whomever was in the back seat doing whatever, and if you were so miserably impoverished as to be saddled with a car that lacked opera windows, old JC was here to help.
I think it’s worth noting that you had two very different options: real opera windows that were actually, you know, windows, that you could see through, but those were difficult to install, requiring cutting holes in your car and all that. The catalog made a point to note the difficulty of the installation with a big IMPORTANT: Warning. And, they reminded you that these windows were non-refundable, so when you found yourself with a crudely hacked-out window hole the shape of Cuba, no, you can’t return the window.
That said, JC isn’t going to leave you hanging! You can get something almost as good for way cheaper and easier: a “Self Adhesive Port Window!” Essentially, this aplastic sticker of an opera window you can just slap on your roof. It won’t do shit to make the inside of your car less dark or claustrophobic, but you’ll think it might from the outside!
Too bad JC Whitney couldn’t have llicensed this fantastic Acme technology that would have made these so much better. 
These last ones I want to show you are quite strange: that Targa band feels more like something you’d find on a European car, like a Porsche 911 Targa, and as such is kind of out of place in this context. I guess it would still dress up a roof with a belt of brightwork, even if I don’t really think it looks like a Targa top.
Those other things, the Window Blank-Out Kits, are a strange sort of way to convert a normal, full-sized window into a much smaller opera-style window. Or, windows. I think to sell this you’d have to throw some vinyl over everything, but I suspect that’s just fine, in this context.
Honestly, I kind of love that all of these options existed! Say what you will about the aesthetic, but you can’t deny that people who bought and install this stuff had to be absolutely loving the shit out of their cars, and, really, that’s what matters. Have at it! Be as superfly as you want to be.
It’s probably a good thing that nunsploitation films never inspired any JC Whitney products.
I grew up in a Pittsburgh steel town in the early 70s and these were all the rage. Plus trunk straps. I remember a particularly virulent orange ’73 Coupe de Ville with the full kit.
But the best thing was the pair of cars owned by a local pimp I would occasionally see in my neighborhood. The first was a ’70 Eldorado painted raspberry red with a padded white vinyl top with landau bars; the second was a ’72 Mark IV in white with the Superfly headlamps, ‘polar bear’ seat covers, padded white vinyl roof, and one of those boomerang TV antennas. The guy really was Leroy Brown.
Oddly enough, my uncle who lived a block up from us also had a raspberry car, but that was a ’73 911.
RE: Targa Bands and Window Blank Out Kits
The window blank out kits was something that some manufacturers were already doing to save on tooling costs. The Dodge Aspen/Plymouth Volare 2-doors had two different rear quarter window treatments. A full window, or a 1/2 window with a vinyl top. If you remove the vinyl top, you can see that the half window was just a fiberglass plug that went into the area of the larger quarter window.
https://www.dvap.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/IMG_5731.jpg
For the Targa bars, several higher end American cars had bars like those from the factory. Usually to create a break for the half vinyl tops that just covered the rear of the roof. Take a look at the Thunderbird Town Landau (https://cdn1.mecum.com/auctions/ch1018/ch1018-333375/images/img1053-1540220507948@2x.jpg?1540319056000)
what, no mention of Curb Feelers? Or side pipes?
Torch, these really did command respect on the street for a few years in the early 70s. Fast cars were going away, and the movie, the soundtrack (still on my iTunes even though Freddie’s been dead for a half century,) man, it was glorious for a while. They didn’t come off as kitschy as you imply, 50 years later.
Yes! , they did!
Even as a child I would avert my eyes lest I be blinded!
Tacky, Tacky, Tacky, omfg NO!
Superfly Terraplane –
https://youtu.be/zGJXDF8dKf4
A guy in my neighborhood in Chicago has a bright blue Caddy with the full on Superfly kit. He has the look too – polyester duds, cowboy hat, jeri curl. I’ve never been able to catch up with him to get the story, but it’s quite spectacular.
I bet there are pallets full of “Economy Landau Bars” still sitting in a warehouse some where.
Driving down the German autobahn today I realized that there is a current car with two of the main „custom“ features mentioned here as standard features: the current Nissan Juke generation.
Big round lights with triangular insert – check!
Prominent upward bulge in the trunk sheetmetal – also check!
https://i0.wp.com/der-autotester.de/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/3-6pm-CET-New-Nissan-JUKE-Unveil-CGI-15-1200×500.Sep_.jpg?ssl=1
Don’t know about anyone else, but now I have Chuck Berry’s song “No money down” running through my head. Always liked that song, thanks Jason.
–Those other things, the Window Blank-Out Kits, are a strange sort of way to convert a normal, full-sized window into a much smaller opera-style window–
Had a 2dr HT ’73 Malibu back in the day, and nearly pulled the trigger on those to cut down on some of that glass area, as it was a total greenhouse.
Oh, and Louvers for the back glass. This was just as the add in glass tinting was getting popular, and kept putting it off.
Ended up buying ’76 Bronco instead.
Around this time MPC made model called the Grand Super Fly so you could have a 1/24th scale plastic pimp mobile.
For ridiculousness you could pimp out a Volkswagen Beetle with a fake Rolls-Royce grille, wire wheel covers and a vinyl top with landau bars
As a side note I low key want to take a Ford waterfall hood pickup with the opera windows in the Super Cab and make an F150 Brougham
Ah, yes. The R&R Beetle!
https://www.reddit.com/r/Shitty_Car_Mods/comments/snkvcg/the_rolls_royce_beetle/
One of the best ROI I ever got was a PA system from JC Whitney that played animal noises for $25 in my high school car.
Is it bad that my car has two of those accessories as original equipment? No, it’s not.
The J C Whitney Catalog has a place in my heart right next to Honest Charlie…”Don’t Got? Can Get!”
That and somewhere around here I have a copy from 83 or 84 that includes an item we sold which was a tool that allowed you to change a valve stem in a wheel without breaking down the bead.
We had a small spot at a trade show at McCormick Place and a Whitney rep came around and found us. Never sold a lot but it’s one of life’s milestones.
So my dad was a small time mechanic in those days, he showed some of us how to use a similar tool. Or maybe it was your tool? Only we never completely replaced the valve stem on some members of a staff that shall not be named at a local higher education establishment!
How could anyone possibly resist the sales pitch?…
???????? ????
SUPER CUSTOMIZE Your Car ????????????????????
????????????????????????!
Oops, that went wrong:
SUPER CUSTOMIZE Your Car BE A TREND SETTER!
I’m amazed the spambot filter let it through.
But I actually like the first one better, as it’s like the internet-in-2022 version of the pitch. Just tell me I can super customize my car AT HOME…
I tried to format the text, but The Autopian was having none of it.
Apart from the fonts and mix of upper and lower case, my favourite bit is “BE A TREND SETTER!”
I imagine whole neighbourhoods seeing a full JC Whitneyed car and rushing en masse to transform their own family rides.
More 70s land yacht content, please. One of the ‘someday’ projects in my head is a BMW S85/DSG in something like a ’72 Regal or a ’73 Thunderbird, double-black and on the ground with air suspension, a fully-boxed frame, and a ruched velour interior in orange and brown.
I’m constantly saddened to see people talk about these absolutely bonkers accessories without anyone chiming in and reminding people that you could fire up Midnight Club 3: DUB Edition Remix and fit things like those headlight covers to the Eldorado in game. Seeing those for the first time in that game formed a core memory for me.