- Title: Herbie Goes Bananas
- IMDb: link
The last of the original Herbie movies takes the car to Brazil by way of Mexico where plans of having him race in the Brazil Grand Prêmio are derailed long before he or current owners Pete (Stephen W. Burns) and D.J. (Charles Martin Smith) ever make it to their destination. Onboard the cruise ship, Herbie befriends a young pickpocket (Joaquin Garay III) who stole not only Pete and D.J.’s wallets but also those of three crooked businessmen (John Vernon, Richard Jaeckel, and Alex Rocco) planning to steal gold from Inca ruins.
The pairing of Herbie and Paco allows for various madcap adventures (including Paco temporarily turning Herbie into a taxi cab and Herbie trying out bullfighting). The actions on the ship lead a strong dislike of the car by the uncompromising Captain Blythe (Harvey Korman) who at one point even makes Herbie walk the plank (so to speak). We also get Elyssa Davalos, as a potential love interest for Pete, and Cloris Leachman as her aunt who, for reasons passing understanding, develops an unreciprocated crush on the captain.
By this point the series was on fumes and Herbie Goes Bananas was the least successful both critically and at the box office. It would be another 17 years for Herbie to find new life in a made-for-TV movie and a total of 25 years before Herbie would return to the big screen. Like the other films in the original series, it’s been released on home video multiple times and is currently available on streaming on Disney+.
