As riots swept France following the police killing of a teenager, dramatic footage of cars falling from a building surfaced in social media posts falsely linking it to the unrest. The clip actually shows a scene from a “Fast and Furious” movie, which was filmed in the US state of Ohio.
“Protesters in France throwing cars,” reads a Thai-language tweet that shared the video on July 4.
“Civil war is coming. Karma strikes back at western colonial empires.”
The clip shows cars falling from a building before they hit the ground and burst into flames.
The video was shared in similar posts on Twitter, Facebook, Telegram and TikTok.
A French policeman sparked riots across the country after killing a teenager during a traffic stop in a Paris suburb.
A bystander’s video of the June 27 shooting contradicted the initial police account of the incident and sparked successive nights of rioting in which cars and public buildings were burnt, businesses looted and youths clashed with police.
Some of the posts falsely claimed the video showed “immigrants” in France pushing cars off a building (here and here).
However, the video shows a scene from “The Fate of the Furious”, the eighth installment in the “Fast and Furious” action movie franchise (archived link).
A reverse image search found the clip in a tweet about filming of the movie posted on June 3, 2016 (archived link).
“Fast & Furious 8 filming in Cleveland. Imagine if you weren’t aware and suddenly saw this,” the tweet says.
The tweet credits the video to Kasey Crabtree, a woman who reportedly saw the movie shooting and posted the video on YouTube (archived link).
Crabtree’s YouTube video is no longer available due to “copyright grounds” by NBC Universal.
However, AFP can confirm the video was filmed in Cleveland in the US state of Ohio.
Visual clues in the footage correspond to Google Maps images of Halle Bros. Parking Garage on Prospect Avenue East in Cleveland’s Gateway District.
US news outlets including WKYC and Fox 8 News reported on road closures in Cleveland ahead of filming in May and June 2016, including Prospect Avenue and Huron Road where the parking garage is located (archived links here and here).
News website Cleveland.com also reported on June 10, 2016 that the movie included a scene where “cars fall out of the Halle garage and explode” (archived link).
The movie was released in 2017.
Cleveland.com also posted a YouTube video showing cars falling out of the building (archived link).
A behind-the-scenes video of the movie production shows seven cars tumbling from of the sixth storey of the parking structure (archived link).
AFP has previously debunked images falsely linked to the unrest in France.
