Albeeno

Guillermo Cain wrote the screenplay for Vanishing Point based on two actual events: the disgraced career of a San Diego police officer and a high-speed pursuit of a man who refused to stop, eventually killing himself when he crashed into a police roadblock. Cain modeled the character of Super Soul after legendary rock and roll singer The Big Bopper, eventually re-naming the character from Super Spic to Super Soul. His script had all the ingredients that reflected the popular alternative hippie-lifestyle of the time: rebellion, drugs, sexual freedom, and rock and roll. In 1969, director Richard Sarafian had turned down an offer to make the Robert Redford film Downhill Racer and was drawn to the counterculture themes in Cain's script. Originally, the director cast Gene Hackman to play Kowalski but 20th Century Fox studio executive Richard Zanuck refused and insisted on relative unknown actor Barry Newman.

According to Sarafian, it was Zanuck who came up with the idea of using the new 1970 Dodge Challenger R/T because he wanted to do Chrysler a favor for providing Fox for many years with cars on a rental base for only a dollar a day. Stunt Coordinator Carey Loftin has said that he requested the Dodge Challenger because of the "quality of the torsion bar suspension and for its horsepower" and felt that it was "a real sturdy, good running car". Five Dodge Challenger R/Ts were loaned to the production by Chrysler for promotional consideration and were returned upon completion of filming. No special equipment was added or modifications made to the cars, except for heavier-duty shocks for the car that jumped over No Name Creek. Loftin remembers that parts were taken out of one car to make another because they "really ruined a couple of those cars", what with jumping ramps from highway to highway and over creeks. Newman remembers that the 440 engines in the cars were so powerful that "it was almost as if there was too much power for the body. You'd put it in first and it would almost rear back!" To convey the appearance of speed, the filmmakers undercranked the cameras. For example, in the scenes with the Challenger and the Jaguar, the camera was cranked at half speed. The cars were traveling at approximately 50 miles per hour but at regular camera speed, they appeared to be much faster.