as the Sunbeam Alpine Mk I Special, with further tuning by ERA to raise power to 106 bhp. Very few of these cars are ever seen on the big screen. However, a sapphire blue Alpine featured prominently in the 1955 Alfred Hitchcock film To Catch a Thief starring Cary Grant and Grace Kelly. More recently, the American PBS show History Detectives tried to verify that an Alpine roadster owned by a private individual was the actual car used in that movie. Although the Technicolor process could "hide" the car's true colour, and knowing that the car was shipped back from Monaco to the US for use in front of a rear projection effect, the car shown on the programme was ultimately proven not to be the film car upon comparison of the vehicle identification numbers. A Mk I model also appears in the 1957 British horror film Night of the Demon. A reference to the Mark I is also made in Muriel Spark's 1957 debut novel, The Comforters, where the supercharged Sunbeam Alpine prompts a race with the protagonists' MG. Alpine Series I to V The first open 2-seater Alpines were based on the Hillman 14 and its successor the Humber Hawk. Rootes replaced them with a softer new smaller 2-seater sports convertible coupé based on the current Hillman Minx and its variants. Kenneth Howes and Jeff Crompton were tasked with doing a complete redesign in 1956, with the goal of producing a dedicated sports car aimed principally at the US market. Howes did some 80 per cent of the overall design. He had been on the Studebaker team at Loewy Studios and then at Ford in Detroit before joining Rootes. The Alpine was produced in four subsequent revisions until 1968. Total production numbered around 70,000. Production stopped shortly after the Chrysler takeover of the Rootes Group. Series I 1959–60 The "Series" Alpine started production in 1959. The Series I was built on a modified floorpan from the Hillman Husky estate car with a engine and made extensive use of components from other Rootes Group vehicles. The running gear came mainly from the Sunbeam Rapier, but with front disc brakes replacing the saloon car's drums. An overdrive unit and wire wheels were optional. The suspension was independent at the front using coil springs and at the rear had a live axle and semi-elliptic springing. The Girling-manufactured brakes used discs at