2017 Ford GT Is No Prince Charming

IN THE original German text of Brother’s Grimm there are few fairytale endings. Rapunzel gets knocked-up; Cinderella’s ugly sisters slip on the glass slipper by hacking off parts of their feet; and Snow White’s antagonist is her own birth mother. Not very Disney.

The Ford GT40 in the 1960's was a giant-killing brute. Suspension failures, cramped cockpit, noisy, and with poor visibility, it challenged every driver. You would never have guessed it when Camillo Pardo created the Ford GT in 2005. It was a cartoon summary of racing for enthusiasts without a license, tapping into memories hard-won by its forebear. Retro design summons intellectual snobbery, but intellects are known for stunted emotions. Cars like the GT are better judged by heart than by head, and there is no denying the emotional allure of Pardo's meisterstuck.

On-lookers at the 2015 Detroit motorshow might be forgiven for scratching their head or clutching their chests when the new Ford GT appeared. Out goes introspection and curated nostalgia; in comes a made-in-America gung-ho low-slung Ferrari-bater. Only an American supercar would slam on four-foot overhangs with a landing-craft rear-deck: no mere 458 rival, these proportions tell us. Nope, this is in the Koenigsegg/Saleen niche, where idiosyncrasies are overlooked, or folded back into the mix and accepted as necessity. This skunk-works missile is a slap in the face for the rapid convergence of the supercar market, devoid of benchmarking and over-shoulder glances. Yet details like the superb headlamps remind you this is going to be more than about 0-60 times.

A while ago Ford had the tagline 'Bold', and bully for them, they have created a product that lends substance to this tell-‘em-like-it-is identity. The Ford GT is blatantly brutal: a cabin is pinched into wild buttresses desperately tethering great blocks of rear fender. A terrapin with after-burners about describes the expression. It is outrageous, and frankly rather vulgar, but this is not for prissy Mercedes owners: this is a poster car for F150 drivers waving the confederate flag. Yee-ha, boys.