Marina City Towers Commercial Shoot

By Scott Smith in Miscellaneous on Oct 16, 2006 1:50PM

The Sears Tower and John Hancock Building have been iconic parts of the Chicago skyline for a while now (check that logo in the corner if you don’t believe us). But thanks to an appearance on a certain album cover a while back, the Marina City Towers may be becoming the go-to Chicago structure … especially if you have to throw a car off of it.

While walking downtown yesterday, we witnessed Allstate Insurance filming a commercial. Most of the action was over by the time we got there, but we watched them suspend this car above the Chicago River, much to the joy of the passing tourists and much to the chagrin of the kayakers below.

We didn’t see whether or not the car ended up in the Chicago River, but the whole thing reminded us of a scene in the final Steve McQueen movie, The Hunter. A car chase through one of the Marina City parking lots ends with McQueen’s prey crashing through a barrier, and diving right into the river, car and all.

Click the jump for more pictures.

UPDATE: Apparently, all similarities to The Hunter were intended as Allstate was re-creating the scene for their commercial and did indeed throw the car into the drink, according to this Sun-Times article.