June 17, 2026

Duel (1971): Spielberg's Road Terror Classic

Duel (1971): Spielberg's Road Terror Classic
Duel (1971): Spielberg's Road Terror Classic
Cinematic Flashback Podcast
Duel (1971): Spielberg's Road Terror Classic
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In this episode of the Cinematic Flashback Podcast, Chuck and Matt continue their Origin Stories month with a look at Duel (1971), Steven Spielberg's breakthrough television thriller starring Dennis Weaver.

What begins as a routine business trip through the California desert turns into a terrifying game of cat and mouse when an ordinary salesman finds himself relentlessly pursued by a mysterious tanker truck. With a simple premise and minimal dialogue, Spielberg creates a tense thriller that still holds up more than fifty years later.

The hosts discuss:

• How Richard Matheson's real-life experience inspired the story
• Spielberg's early career and the road that led to Duel
• Dennis Weaver's performance as David Mann
• The truck as the film's true villain
• The differences between the television and theatrical versions
• The film's connections to Jaws and Spielberg's later work
• The practical filmmaking techniques that helped create the suspense

They also talk about the ABC Movie of the Week, the challenges of making a film on a tight television schedule, and why Duel remains one of the most memorable made-for-TV movies ever produced.

As always, it all comes down to the final question:

Does Duel groove through the decades… or lose its beat?

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WEBVTT

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I want to cut it out right, just just cut

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it out. Okay. So wow, now come on, I mean, please,

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I don't. Let's not play games.

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Well, how are you talking about?

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I'm called please? Do you think that I won't?

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You know, mister, if you think you can take that truck,

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if you wis and just use it as a murder weapon,

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just killing people on the highway, you're wrong. You've got

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another thing coming.

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Welcome to the Cinematic Flashback Podcast. Get ready to hop

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into the wayback machine as we journey through the wild,

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bolt and unforgettable films of the nineteen seventies. Each episode,

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do we break down a classic movie or forgotten Jim

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seeing how it performed then and now, and wrapping things

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up by asking did a groove for the decades or

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did it lose its feat I am your host, Chuck Bryant,

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and today we are reviewing Steven Spielberg's nineteen seventy one

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thriller Duel starring Dennis Weaver. This is our second film

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in our Origin Stories month, where we focused on the

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first films of directors in the seventies. Last time, we

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looked at George Lucas's THHX eleven thirty eight, and this

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time we are focusing on Steven Spielberg and I am

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looking in my rearview mirror and writing my bumper is

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Matt Sargent. Matt, welcome back Burg.

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I'm coming right up with you. Chuck.

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Yeah.

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Oh, I'm so happy to be doing this origin series

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because it casts a lot of light on how these

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directors we might call their formative films that certainly they

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weren't watching the movie of the week or something with

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the family and would have been a movie that we

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would have watched. I'm surprised that we didn't see it. It

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probably came out at some time or something or other

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that we weren't watching, because back then you didn't have

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DVRs or VCRs or anything like that. You watched it

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when it was broadcast.

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Matt, in our very first episode of the Cinematic Flashback,

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you used a phrase that I had never heard before.

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It was appointment scheduling television. What did you mean by.

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That, Well, it's like, you know, you knew when when

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mash came on it was at a certain time on

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a certain day of the week, and everybody made sure

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they were available. I mean that went up until my

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college years because we watched Magnum Pi on Thursday evenings

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at my apartment in Harrisonburg. My best friend from college

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and still very very good friend of mine, probably still

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my best friend. He would come over to the apartment

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and we'd watch Magnum Pi. And a lot of people

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had shows like that obviously, you know, there were soap

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operas that were on every afternoon that people watched. That

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sort of thing very common.

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Sometimes the ABC movie the Week was actually a theatrical

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film that they had cut for television. That's how I saw.

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A lot of the films were rated are, but they

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had been sanitized a little bit.

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Yeah, they sometimes sanitize them for content, but also they

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would cut them to fit into the available time slots

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and commercial breaks. So one hundred and twenty minute movie

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with commercial breaks might be way too long to broadcast,

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so they would cut out. So that's where a lot

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of and I believe I remember hearing stories about directors saying,

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I won't put my film on TV because it'll they'll

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just chop the butcher it, yea. And they feel like

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they've already cut it to the bone to tell the

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story they want to tell, and they just can't imagine

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cutting anything more out now. I think we've all seen

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a few films that could bear with a little cutting

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out in the middle. So again, an artist in this

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craft might sometimes not always be compatible with selling.

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So well, great, I'm sure we're going to talk more

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about made for TV movies today since this is the

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topic of movie that we're watching.

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Matt, who do we have talking to us today? Well,

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I'm happy to report that we have Maddie B. Nineteen

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and that is not me. I did not make a

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suit about that. I did not make a pseudonym to

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make a comment. Guys, listen to last episode. We had

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a comment that was a little more critical. This one's

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a little more positive. So we like to mix in

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the good with the bad. So here we go. So

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he brings a quote from one of our favorite films,

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Dirty Harry. He left us five stars, thank you very

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much and says quote, do you feel lucky? The podcast

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is informative, fun and insightful. If you're a fan of

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seventies films, you just hit the jackpot. The logo is

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really good as well. Thank you, Maddie B. Nineteen for

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that review. We really appreciate it. We hope you tell

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your friends that you like the podcast and you find

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it somewhat pleasurable to listen to and somewhat informative. That's

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what we're here for. To have a little fun and

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to sort of spread the good word of some famous

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seventies films and a new light and sometimes some maybe

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not so well known seventies films.

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So that's the mission. That's the first time anyone has

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ever commented on our logo. To be honest, I think

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I found some clip art and it eventually evolved where

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I thought of putting a TIEDI item behind it. That's

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the evolution of that logo.

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I feel strongly that our listeners are going to now

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take some of our podcast, go to an ai and

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generate us a new logo and then post it on

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our reviews and we will look at each of those

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logos and have some fun with them.

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That's very good.

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You guys can use your own tokens to generate those

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logo or send us the prompt you know exactly. So

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we are looking at Steven Spielberg's first film, and I know, Chuck,

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you always have a lot of information with a little

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bit of backstory. How did this movie happen?

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Matt. To rightly discuss how this movie happened, we have

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to go back just a little to nineteen six when

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Sid Sheinberg joined the television division of MCA and Universal.

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Now Sid is important for a couple of reasons. One,

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he became one of the key figures of modern television

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entertainment by popularizing the concept of quality made for TV movies.

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The other reason is because of a short twenty six

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minute film that he watched called Amblin, directed by this

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young English major attending cal State Long Beach. That student,

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as you may have guessed, was Steven Spielberg. While Amblin

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may have been his first film shot on thirty five

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millimeter film, it was not his first film. Spielberg had

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been making movies since he was a kid, and what

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Sid Sheinberg saw was talent, and he offered Spielberg a

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seven year contract to come work for him in television.

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His first television episode was for the Rod Sterling anthology

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series called Night Gallery. The episode Spielberg was a sign

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was called Eyes and Joan Crawford.

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I remember more than anything else, the first day of shooting.

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The crew had a very antagonistic reaction to my involvement

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as the director of the show. Because in those days

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we're talk about nineteen sixty nine, the crews the average

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age was fifty to fifty five and sixty. And these

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crew members who worked with all the great directors, they

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worked with capperin Sturges, they worked with Hawks and Ford,

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they worked with CB de Mill And I remember Joan

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giving a speech and standing up and saying, I have

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great respect for this director. I've worked with him before

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a Small White Life, and I want you to treat

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him as well as you would treat me. Well, we're

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all professionals. And I don't forget that speech he gave

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to the whole crew. And from that moment on, not

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only did the crew should be better, but Joan treating

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me like I've been directing for fifty years. She I

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guess just imagined I was George Kukoor.

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But Spielberg is only half of the equation. For the

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second half, we have to leave the seventies and go

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back to Friday, November twenty second, nineteen sixty three, the

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day that JFK was assassinated. Writer Richard Matheson was playing

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golf with a friend when he heard the news.

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The idea for Duel came to me on the day

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that President Kennedy was assassinated. A friend and I were

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playing golf over in Filmore, and when we came in

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for lunch, we heard about the assassination, and we were

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so distressed by the news that of course we forgot

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about the golf game and started going home. And as

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we were going through this narrow pass on the way

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back home, this huge truck started tailgating us, and we

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went faster and faster. He went faster and faster, and

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we were screaming out the windows, with as much fury

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about the assassination as about him trying to kill it.

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And finally my friend pulled off into a dirt siding

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and his car spun around, and this truck went flying past,

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and we were really shaken up by it, but having

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the true writer's mind, within a few moments, I thought,

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ah Man gets chased by a truck, and I wrote

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on an.

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Envelope That incident led him to write a teleplay called Duel,

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but no studio wanted it. Matheson adapted the story to

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a novel lette and found it published in Playboy magazine

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in March of nineteen seventy one, and this is where

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Nona Tyson, Spielberg's assistant, spotted it and brought it to

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his attention. But Spielberg was considered too inexperienced. Fortunately, he

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had advocates like Sheinberg and Duel's producer George Eckstein. Based

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on his television work, Spielberg was already employing techniques by

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two of his heroes, John Fordes and Howard Hawkes. He

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would use wide shots to establish a scene and then

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close ups to tell the narrative. The film was so

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affected that Universal later financed additional scenes so it could

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be expanded into a theatrical feature for overseas distribution. Today,

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Spielberg's production company is still named after his short film

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Ambling and the relationship between Spielberg Sheinberg. In Universal, it

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became one of the most successful director studio partnerships in

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Hollywood history, producing films like Jaws Et, Jurassic Park, Schindler's List,

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and many more. And Matt, that is how this film happened.

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That's an amazing story, and it's cool to get that

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background on how it kind of came to be and

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that it was a little bit of a test case

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and they picked the right guy. It would seem as

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a director.

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The story is is that he only had ten days

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to shoot duel. That's amazing, and he did it in

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thirteen and because of how efficiently he shot the first

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three days and they were seeing how quickly he was

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shooting that thirteen days was not a problem.

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That's amazing. And I mean it goes to the thing.

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It's like it's a TV move it the movie. The

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budgets are smaller, the time frame that you can shoot in.

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And we talked about the size of the screen. Nowadays,

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people don't realize that when you were watching film, you know,

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something on TV in the nineteen seventies, you weren't looking

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at a four K image. You were looking at you know,

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with five hundred and twenty five lines of resolution or

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something like that on a sure you know, it was

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just not of high resolution screen. So the idea of

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wide shots is exactly what they're saying. You always had

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close ups. That's why the soap operas and personal drama

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films where you had close ups of everybody face has

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worked really well because that worked great on that format.

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So it was a real it was a real trick

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for him to get something this exciting in that format

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and have it so well received by the by the

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watching public so well. With that said, I think we're

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just about ready to get into production details. But before

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we could do that, we need to take a quick break.

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Back and amatic flash back the.

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Movie of the Week presenting the world premiere of an

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original motion picture produced especially for EBC. Tonight on the

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Movie of the Week, you are man hit that car

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head on Dennis Weaver, Open Jack, I've read why why

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is he doing this?

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Feel welcome back. Let's go through the production details. Duel

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originally aired on November thirteenth, nineteen seventy one, as part

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of ABC's Movie of the Week. It was later given

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an international theatrical release by Universal, with additional footage bringing

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the running time from seventy four minutes to ninety minutes.

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And what is remarkable here is that Duel was made

227
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for around four hundred and fifty thousand dollars. The film

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was directed by a twenty four year old Steven Spielberg

229
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and what essentially was his feature film debut. The screenplay

230
00:13:23.679 --> 00:13:27.279
was written by Richard Matheson, adapting his story that had

231
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originally appeared in Playboy magazine. Earlier that same year. Duel

232
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would be Man's last short story. The cinematographer was Jack Marta,

233
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and Spielberg insisted on shooting out on a real desert

234
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highway in California, even though the production team thought that

235
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the schedule and budget were just too tight to make

236
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that practical. The entire movie was shot in roughly thirteen days.

237
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As a note, Matt Spielberg would make this same decision

238
00:13:54.240 --> 00:13:56.919
later when he decided to shoot Jaws not on a

239
00:13:57.120 --> 00:13:59.960
production studio backlot but out on the open ocean.

240
00:14:00.440 --> 00:14:02.960
Yeah, and Martha's vineyard right exactly.

241
00:14:03.080 --> 00:14:06.840
The score was not composed by John Williams. That relationship

242
00:14:06.840 --> 00:14:10.840
would start in his next film, The Sugarland Express. The

243
00:14:10.879 --> 00:14:14.759
score was composed by Billy Goldberg, who had already worked

244
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with Spielberg on television projects before Duel. Spielberg did not

245
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want a musical score. He wanted noise. For my money.

246
00:14:23.519 --> 00:14:26.759
This score reminded me a lot of Bernard Hermann's music

247
00:14:26.840 --> 00:14:32.559
from Psycho. And there is very little dialogue in this movie.

248
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Yes, it's definitely a movie of action and things happening. Necessarily, Also,

249
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this movie is limited to really to the main action

250
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that's going on, so we don't have a very big cast. Yeah,

251
00:14:46.240 --> 00:14:48.799
it's just a few people, and will lead off with

252
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the main character, Dennis Weaver playing David Mann. And as

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you say, he is an every man, and I think

254
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the name of the character David Mann is meant to that.

255
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At the time that this movie was made, Dennis Weaver

256
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was appearing in the TV show McCloud. He was Sam McLeod,

257
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the lead character in that show, and they stopped production

258
00:15:11.320 --> 00:15:13.559
for McLeod for the thirteen days that it took to

259
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film this. I was speaking about this film to a

260
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friend at work and he said, oh, Dennis Weaver, he

261
00:15:19.799 --> 00:15:23.679
played Chester on gun Smoke, And that blew my mind

262
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because growing up as a kid, Gun Smoke was one

263
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of my favorite TV shows and I remember Chester vividly,

264
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and I did not put it together that these two

265
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characters were played by the same actor.

266
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Picture me the same way, because I'm thinking two hundred

267
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and ninety episodes of gun Spot. That's amazing. And I've

268
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always liked Dennis Weaver. I though, yeah, you know, I

269
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I of course remember him from all of the regular

270
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stuff he came upon later because you know, being my age,

271
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you know, I sort of realized these things when I

272
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got older and he had kind of you know, moved

273
00:15:57.000 --> 00:16:00.559
out of you know, Gentle Ben and McLoud and unspoken

274
00:16:00.720 --> 00:16:04.440
was in sort of featured actor on the love Boat

275
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and stuff like that or whatever. Maybe I don't even

276
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know if that happened, but my guess is probably because

277
00:16:09.600 --> 00:16:13.759
that's sure they would. Yeah, everybody went through the through

278
00:16:13.799 --> 00:16:16.440
the love Boat. But yeah, I've always thought Dennis Sweever

279
00:16:17.200 --> 00:16:19.960
was a great actor. I mean clearly from this just

280
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this little list we have of Chester on gun Smoke,

281
00:16:23.240 --> 00:16:27.399
Tom Wedlow on General Ben, which another show I watched

282
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as a kid, forty six episodes of McLeod obviously he

283
00:16:31.240 --> 00:16:34.200
was the main character. Is amazing. I mean, that's that's

284
00:16:34.240 --> 00:16:38.120
a huge television repertoire right there. That's years and years

285
00:16:38.159 --> 00:16:41.360
of working actor. You can't not be good to be

286
00:16:41.480 --> 00:16:42.440
engaged that long.

287
00:16:42.840 --> 00:16:45.919
So, Matt, we don't have a lot of actors. I

288
00:16:46.159 --> 00:16:50.720
did want to recognize the truck driver because we only

289
00:16:51.080 --> 00:16:54.600
see an outline of him and we see his arm,

290
00:16:54.639 --> 00:16:57.679
but we never really see him or interact directly with

291
00:16:57.799 --> 00:17:02.679
him as a character. But he was played by Carrie Lofton,

292
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and Carrie was an American professional stuntman, a stunt coordinator

293
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and an actor. He was called the greatest car man

294
00:17:11.680 --> 00:17:15.079
in the business, and he was in such movies as

295
00:17:15.519 --> 00:17:19.359
stunt coordinator on Bullet he was involved with our favorite

296
00:17:19.440 --> 00:17:23.440
car chase scene in The French Connection. Duell got him

297
00:17:23.559 --> 00:17:27.440
his most iconic role for the main character, truck, and

298
00:17:27.519 --> 00:17:32.480
because of that, he got cast as the stuntman for

299
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over thirty movies and television programs that involved trucks, including

300
00:17:39.440 --> 00:17:43.079
White Line, Fever, Smoky in the Bandit as well as

301
00:17:43.079 --> 00:17:45.240
its sequel, I don't know if you remember BJ and

302
00:17:45.279 --> 00:17:49.279
the Bear, the TV show A hundred. Was also one

303
00:17:49.279 --> 00:17:53.000
of the drivers for Sylvester Stallone and Over the Top,

304
00:17:53.319 --> 00:17:58.880
and he also drove the green Goblin truck in Maximum Overdrive.

305
00:18:00.440 --> 00:18:04.000
How cool is it to actually end up going out

306
00:18:04.240 --> 00:18:07.920
of a long career being the truck guy. I mean, like, like,

307
00:18:07.960 --> 00:18:10.960
there's enough movies that are out there about semi trucks

308
00:18:11.240 --> 00:18:14.480
that you can make a successful career being the guy.

309
00:18:14.839 --> 00:18:18.200
Yeah, well, you know there. I remember this is where

310
00:18:18.200 --> 00:18:21.839
my age will show. I remember being in the nineteen seventies,

311
00:18:21.880 --> 00:18:24.160
and of course this movie must be one of the

312
00:18:24.200 --> 00:18:27.319
main reasons why you were out. We would every summer

313
00:18:27.400 --> 00:18:30.440
go on these long trips to Cape Cod from northern Virginia,

314
00:18:30.519 --> 00:18:32.400
so it's like a twelve hour drive. When you were

315
00:18:32.440 --> 00:18:35.880
in a VW bus which only went about sixty miles

316
00:18:35.920 --> 00:18:38.119
an hour, so it was like a twelve hour drive.

317
00:18:38.160 --> 00:18:40.119
So you're out there with the trucks all the time,

318
00:18:40.160 --> 00:18:41.400
and you know, you're like, oh.

319
00:18:41.359 --> 00:18:41.960
The big trucks.

320
00:18:41.960 --> 00:18:43.079
Everybody scared of the truck.

321
00:18:43.240 --> 00:18:43.720
Yeah.

322
00:18:43.759 --> 00:18:47.480
It took until I was an older person driving myself

323
00:18:47.519 --> 00:18:49.880
on the highways to realize that truck drivers, you know,

324
00:18:49.960 --> 00:18:53.920
professional truck drivers are really really good drivers. They generally

325
00:18:54.039 --> 00:18:57.799
don't cause any trouble. It doesn't help them in any way.

326
00:18:57.839 --> 00:19:00.200
To be kind, I'm not trying to murder, you know,

327
00:19:00.559 --> 00:19:02.920
not at all, but I mean did most of the

328
00:19:03.039 --> 00:19:05.880
driving car public thinks that's the case, but they clearly

329
00:19:05.880 --> 00:19:08.480
aren't because they need to get and deliver their load.

330
00:19:08.559 --> 00:19:11.720
They don't need any of this nonsense of an accident

331
00:19:11.839 --> 00:19:14.720
or something happening or the police being called on them.

332
00:19:15.079 --> 00:19:18.319
The other thing that's starkly apparent in this movie, just

333
00:19:18.319 --> 00:19:24.559
all the quick aside, is the lack of phones. Like nowadays,

334
00:19:24.680 --> 00:19:26.599
this wouldn't happen because you just get on your cell

335
00:19:26.640 --> 00:19:29.599
phone and go, hey, this, This truck is harassing me

336
00:19:29.680 --> 00:19:31.720
and the next thing you know, the police would be swarming.

337
00:19:31.839 --> 00:19:34.440
But back then you can barely find a payphone.

338
00:19:34.640 --> 00:19:37.519
Our dear listeners know that Matt and I do have

339
00:19:37.559 --> 00:19:41.319
a thing about phones in the seventies and how these

340
00:19:41.359 --> 00:19:44.240
movies today would have to find a different stick to

341
00:19:44.359 --> 00:19:44.720
make them.

342
00:19:45.119 --> 00:19:46.759
You'd have to be in some kind of Oh, there's

343
00:19:47.279 --> 00:19:52.240
a nationwide cellular outage, and then we can have this movie. Anyway,

344
00:19:52.640 --> 00:19:55.799
Let's move on to a couple of other actors which

345
00:19:55.880 --> 00:19:59.359
I actually got were kind of they tickled me. And

346
00:19:59.400 --> 00:20:02.200
there's not everybody else is a bit character, right, there's

347
00:20:02.240 --> 00:20:04.559
really nobody else in this film. They're only in it

348
00:20:04.640 --> 00:20:06.880
for like a second, yeah, or you know, a scene

349
00:20:06.960 --> 00:20:09.119
or two to kind of set some more thing. But

350
00:20:09.240 --> 00:20:11.839
really they're not recurring at all because of the nature

351
00:20:11.880 --> 00:20:14.400
of the film is they're driving through the desert, so

352
00:20:14.480 --> 00:20:16.279
I mean, anybody they're running into, they're sort of going

353
00:20:16.359 --> 00:20:18.200
to interact with and then they're going to drive off,

354
00:20:18.279 --> 00:20:20.359
you know, going on. But the one of the funniest

355
00:20:20.400 --> 00:20:23.839
one in The Funniest Ones is Lucille Benson, and she

356
00:20:24.039 --> 00:20:26.759
is the lady that runs the snake a Rama.

357
00:20:27.079 --> 00:20:30.359
Oh that that was a great scene. That was a

358
00:20:30.400 --> 00:20:34.559
great scene that that that's playing into your phone booths scene,

359
00:20:34.839 --> 00:20:38.519
because that's that's where the truck comes crashing through the

360
00:20:38.519 --> 00:20:40.880
phone booth while Dennis Lever is trying to make a call.

361
00:20:41.359 --> 00:20:44.480
Yeah, that is actually in my recollection of the film,

362
00:20:44.519 --> 00:20:48.519
that was the first really overt murderous intent.

363
00:20:48.599 --> 00:20:49.799
Sure in the film.

364
00:20:49.960 --> 00:20:52.599
Everything else was a guy running up on your bumper,

365
00:20:53.079 --> 00:20:57.039
angry that you pass them type of behavior. Maybe there

366
00:20:57.079 --> 00:21:01.079
was a bump I can't because they ran into the

367
00:21:01.279 --> 00:21:04.799
it ran into the fence. But I mean basically though.

368
00:21:04.720 --> 00:21:06.039
Pushing him into the train.

369
00:21:06.480 --> 00:21:09.079
All of that could have been like, oh I bumped

370
00:21:09.119 --> 00:21:11.720
you by a mistake, you know, But this one was

371
00:21:11.759 --> 00:21:15.319
he literally. But the funniest part about this is, and

372
00:21:15.440 --> 00:21:17.440
I always do this kind of thing, I kind of

373
00:21:17.480 --> 00:21:19.720
like to look in the background of scenes. Yeah, and

374
00:21:20.160 --> 00:21:22.359
the scene at the at the Snake Rama, which is

375
00:21:22.359 --> 00:21:25.000
a gas station but also has all these cage snakes

376
00:21:25.160 --> 00:21:29.519
in the background, there's an old time Corse drawn carriage

377
00:21:29.559 --> 00:21:34.559
type thing that's titled Doctor Stringfellow's or Juvenator Medicine show movie,

378
00:21:34.640 --> 00:21:37.359
Wow medicine show thing. It's a trailer back there. You

379
00:21:37.400 --> 00:21:39.119
can barely see it. I pause the movie to look

380
00:21:39.119 --> 00:21:40.720
at it because I were like, that seems I wonder

381
00:21:40.759 --> 00:21:43.359
if that's real. I wonder if that is a real thing,

382
00:21:43.400 --> 00:21:45.279
because it was like, it looks like it's something from

383
00:21:45.319 --> 00:21:48.519
you know, the old days. What turns out that that

384
00:21:48.680 --> 00:21:54.200
wagon actually came because it was part of a scene

385
00:21:54.559 --> 00:21:57.720
from another show in the Night Gallery. Here in an

386
00:21:57.759 --> 00:22:01.559
episode season two, episode nine of Night Gallery, which aired

387
00:22:01.599 --> 00:22:05.160
in November of seventy one, the same year Duel was released,

388
00:22:05.440 --> 00:22:08.559
and the segment in that show, Forrest Tucker plays doctor

389
00:22:08.640 --> 00:22:12.000
Ernest Stringfellow, a fraudulent Old West medicine man.

390
00:22:12.279 --> 00:22:13.559
So oh that's cool.

391
00:22:14.240 --> 00:22:16.720
Why help you missed too?

392
00:22:16.960 --> 00:22:20.680
Or you go to total out in back for surely

393
00:22:21.759 --> 00:22:22.759
something for your car?

394
00:22:25.240 --> 00:22:27.640
Well you can put one effle, you can get in

395
00:22:27.680 --> 00:22:28.839
a tank, all regy.

396
00:22:35.440 --> 00:22:38.440
Would you mind checking those Radiator hosts out they.

397
00:22:39.200 --> 00:22:41.079
Take a look at nice nights if you have so.

398
00:22:41.799 --> 00:22:46.480
Steven Spielberg has a kind of a paying it forward

399
00:22:46.599 --> 00:22:51.599
where he will reuse different actors or different nods to

400
00:22:51.799 --> 00:22:56.759
previous movies in future movies. In the movie nineteen forty one,

401
00:22:57.160 --> 00:23:01.759
there's the scene where John Belushi's wild Bill is landing

402
00:23:01.799 --> 00:23:05.319
his plane out in the desert and he lands at

403
00:23:05.640 --> 00:23:09.079
snake a Rama. It's the same gas station. It has

404
00:23:09.200 --> 00:23:12.839
Lucille Benson as the lady who fills up his gas

405
00:23:12.880 --> 00:23:20.799
tank with ethel up so.

406
00:23:20.880 --> 00:23:24.359
Along with Spielberg's callback for gas Mama in the film

407
00:23:24.480 --> 00:23:29.319
nineteen forty one. He also has two actors that appear

408
00:23:29.359 --> 00:23:32.640
in this film, Amy Douglas and Alexander Lockwood. They're an

409
00:23:32.720 --> 00:23:36.599
elderly couple in the car that you know that is

410
00:23:37.119 --> 00:23:41.839
encountered along the way. And it's interesting Spielberg would later

411
00:23:42.000 --> 00:23:45.440
place both those actors in Close Encounters of the Third Kind,

412
00:23:45.480 --> 00:23:48.200
which is a cool got a callback, you know.

413
00:23:48.440 --> 00:23:51.720
That's right. These two characters I want to believe were

414
00:23:51.759 --> 00:23:55.119
involved in the dual incident and then later would be

415
00:23:55.200 --> 00:23:59.519
the same characters involved in the Close Encounters incident. That's

416
00:23:59.599 --> 00:24:01.960
that's how I want to believe that were in.

417
00:24:01.960 --> 00:24:04.759
The same universe. Yeah, yeah, they're in the same universe.

418
00:24:06.319 --> 00:24:09.119
Okay, man, I think I think we've covered all of

419
00:24:09.160 --> 00:24:09.880
our actors.

420
00:24:10.000 --> 00:24:13.640
Oh no, no, no, I beg to differ. We have

421
00:24:13.799 --> 00:24:17.319
more really we need to talk about. Okay, And that

422
00:24:17.559 --> 00:24:22.759
character in this film actually had auditions, and that character

423
00:24:22.920 --> 00:24:24.000
is the truck.

424
00:24:23.960 --> 00:24:25.519
They auditioned a truck.

425
00:24:25.640 --> 00:24:28.920
Yeah, so there's actually two trucks. One was destroyed at

426
00:24:28.960 --> 00:24:30.960
the end of the film, obviously, So tell me about

427
00:24:30.960 --> 00:24:35.200
this audition. I'm curious. Well, it turns out Steven Spielberg

428
00:24:35.279 --> 00:24:37.559
looked at a variety of different trucks that it might

429
00:24:37.599 --> 00:24:39.599
be used and tried to pick one out. And Steven

430
00:24:39.759 --> 00:24:45.200
Spielberg really favored the traditional look of an elongated front truck.

431
00:24:45.319 --> 00:24:47.880
He felt like it looked more like a face. It

432
00:24:47.960 --> 00:24:51.279
had the big dark windows as eyes, had the big

433
00:24:51.319 --> 00:24:54.839
long snout. You know, it's a very almost feral type

434
00:24:54.880 --> 00:24:57.240
of look to it, kind of aggressive, very hard to

435
00:24:57.279 --> 00:25:00.519
see into it. And from the angle this shot, and

436
00:25:00.559 --> 00:25:02.319
we'll talk a little bit about that, there was a

437
00:25:02.319 --> 00:25:04.599
lot of low angles kind of from the bumper and

438
00:25:04.640 --> 00:25:06.519
from the bumper when that truck is very close, you

439
00:25:06.559 --> 00:25:09.559
can't even see the driver. Yeah, you just see that

440
00:25:09.759 --> 00:25:13.519
giant radiator type front end grill of the truck. So

441
00:25:13.559 --> 00:25:15.119
it was very effective and I think he made a

442
00:25:15.160 --> 00:25:17.240
great selection. The other part about the truck is at

443
00:25:17.240 --> 00:25:20.960
it it looks in disrepair. It looks very rugged, and

444
00:25:21.319 --> 00:25:25.839
it has the words flammable written all over it. Very

445
00:25:25.880 --> 00:25:29.319
disconcerting for someone being followed by a truck full of

446
00:25:29.400 --> 00:25:31.119
some sort of explosive liquid.

447
00:25:31.279 --> 00:25:34.519
Now you saw all the multiple license plates on the front.

448
00:25:34.559 --> 00:25:38.200
Spielberg said that they were suggesting that maybe this driver

449
00:25:38.799 --> 00:25:41.920
was perhaps a serial killer, and that these plates were

450
00:25:42.079 --> 00:25:46.440
possibly his trophies from other vehicles that he had run down.

451
00:25:46.920 --> 00:25:49.119
I actually looked at it and thought, oh, I guess

452
00:25:49.119 --> 00:25:50.799
it's back in the days where you had to get

453
00:25:50.799 --> 00:25:54.039
a truck license for every state you operated in. But

454
00:25:54.119 --> 00:25:55.960
then I thought about that, and I'm like, I'm not

455
00:25:56.000 --> 00:25:56.920
sure if that's a thing.

456
00:25:57.119 --> 00:26:00.759
And that was exactly my thought as well. All just

457
00:26:00.839 --> 00:26:04.000
watching some behind the scenes, Yeah, well that's cool, Matt.

458
00:26:04.079 --> 00:26:07.599
It's November thirteenth, nineteen seventy one. You and your family

459
00:26:07.599 --> 00:26:10.119
are sitting down in front of the TV. Your dad's

460
00:26:10.160 --> 00:26:12.519
got the TV guy and he's reading it about this

461
00:26:12.599 --> 00:26:15.599
movie called Duel. What are you guys about to tune into?

462
00:26:16.200 --> 00:26:18.440
I think it was probably went more like, we're sitting

463
00:26:18.480 --> 00:26:21.200
down to see a nice, lovely movie with that great

464
00:26:21.240 --> 00:26:26.079
actor that we love so much, Dennis Weaver, and probably

465
00:26:26.119 --> 00:26:28.400
going to be something along the lines a gentle Bend

466
00:26:28.720 --> 00:26:33.119
or a reprise of his role in Gunsmoke and the

467
00:26:33.160 --> 00:26:38.839
movie starts and you're like, we're not in Kansas anymore anyway,

468
00:26:38.920 --> 00:26:42.200
So here, let me read you. This Duel is a

469
00:26:42.279 --> 00:26:46.599
stripped down suspense thriller about an ordinary salesman driving through

470
00:26:46.640 --> 00:26:51.480
the California desert who finds himself relentlessly pursued by a

471
00:26:51.519 --> 00:26:56.680
mysterious tanker truck after a seemingly minor encounter on the highway.

472
00:26:56.920 --> 00:27:02.039
What begins as irritation slowly turns into paranoia and survival

473
00:27:02.079 --> 00:27:06.720
as Steven Spielberg transforms an everyday stretch of road into

474
00:27:06.759 --> 00:27:13.480
something tense, isolating, and deeply unsettling. Minimal dialogue, practical filmmate making,

475
00:27:13.640 --> 00:27:17.559
and mounting suspense turn a very simple premise into one

476
00:27:17.599 --> 00:27:20.880
of the most effective thrillers of the nineteen seventies.

477
00:27:21.079 --> 00:27:24.079
All right, when we come back, we're diving into our

478
00:27:24.160 --> 00:27:27.240
thoughts on Duel, but first we need to take a

479
00:27:27.319 --> 00:27:29.000
quick break. Don't go anywhere.

480
00:27:31.720 --> 00:27:33.160
Would you like to hop into the phone booth with

481
00:27:33.160 --> 00:27:35.359
Bill and Ted, go back in time with Huey Lewis,

482
00:27:35.480 --> 00:27:38.160
and dive into the totally tubular world of the nineteen eighties.

483
00:27:38.319 --> 00:27:41.400
Welcome to Children of the Eighties, the most excellent podcast that

484
00:27:41.480 --> 00:27:44.079
takes you on a nostalgia fuel journey through the Rattus

485
00:27:44.079 --> 00:27:46.920
decade in history. Join June and Lindsay.

486
00:27:46.720 --> 00:27:48.960
As we transport you to a time when Neon ruled,

487
00:27:49.000 --> 00:27:52.240
big hair was gnarly, and the music was like totally radical.

488
00:27:52.440 --> 00:27:54.720
Children of the Eighties is the ultimate time machine to

489
00:27:54.759 --> 00:27:56.720
relive the most epic decade ever.

490
00:27:56.920 --> 00:27:59.440
So grab your walkmin dust off your VHS tape, then

491
00:27:59.559 --> 00:28:01.640
join us or a righteous blast from the past.

492
00:28:01.720 --> 00:28:05.240
Get ready to rewind, reminisce and rock out with Children.

493
00:28:04.839 --> 00:28:05.359
Of the Eighties.

494
00:28:05.400 --> 00:28:07.680
Subscribe now wherever you get your podcasts and let the

495
00:28:07.720 --> 00:28:14.880
eighties magic begintic flash.

496
00:28:14.599 --> 00:28:19.440
Back Welcome back. From here on out, We're gonna be

497
00:28:19.440 --> 00:28:22.720
talking about the movie and that may contain spoilers, so

498
00:28:22.880 --> 00:28:26.480
be aware. If you haven't already watched Duel and you

499
00:28:26.559 --> 00:28:29.519
don't want the spoilers to ruin it for you, hit pause,

500
00:28:29.880 --> 00:28:32.160
go rent it at the usual locations, and come back

501
00:28:32.240 --> 00:28:35.400
right here and continue playing. I think you may get

502
00:28:35.400 --> 00:28:37.759
more out of it, although I don't have a problem

503
00:28:37.799 --> 00:28:39.960
if you want to listen to the spoilers. It's still

504
00:28:39.960 --> 00:28:42.440
a thrilling movie even if you know how things turn out.

505
00:28:43.119 --> 00:28:46.160
Matt, have you ever heard of the Hitchcock bomb analogy,

506
00:28:46.440 --> 00:28:49.519
I have not. Okay, Hitchcock tells it this way. Four

507
00:28:49.599 --> 00:28:53.119
people are sitting around the table talking about baseball. Five

508
00:28:53.160 --> 00:28:57.240
minutes of it, it's really dull. Suddenly boom, a bomb

509
00:28:57.319 --> 00:29:00.279
goes off, blows the people the smithereens. What did the

510
00:29:00.319 --> 00:29:03.759
audience have? They have ten seconds of shock. Take the

511
00:29:03.839 --> 00:29:07.119
same scene and tell the audience that there's a bomb

512
00:29:07.359 --> 00:29:09.240
under the table and that it's going to go off

513
00:29:09.279 --> 00:29:13.680
in five minutes. Now the whole emotion of the audience

514
00:29:13.759 --> 00:29:17.519
is totally different because you've give them them that information.

515
00:29:18.079 --> 00:29:21.319
Now that conversation about baseball becomes very vital because the

516
00:29:21.359 --> 00:29:25.160
audience is saying, don't be ridiculous, stop talking about baseball.

517
00:29:25.400 --> 00:29:29.680
There's a bomb under there. You've got the audience working

518
00:29:29.960 --> 00:29:34.079
for you. And I think that Steven Spielberg must have

519
00:29:34.160 --> 00:29:37.839
taken some lessons from Alfred Hitchcock, because I feel he's

520
00:29:37.920 --> 00:29:41.039
set that story up at the beginning in the same way.

521
00:29:41.279 --> 00:29:41.920
What do you think?

522
00:29:42.119 --> 00:29:45.400
I agree? I agree. I think the radiator hose is

523
00:29:45.480 --> 00:29:47.480
definitely the bomb in this story.

524
00:29:47.599 --> 00:29:50.240
Oh yeah, at least it's what do they call it,

525
00:29:50.319 --> 00:29:54.079
Chekhov's gun, It's Chehoff's radiator hoses. They introduce it in

526
00:29:54.119 --> 00:29:55.559
the first act, so you know in the third act

527
00:29:55.599 --> 00:29:56.960
it's going to come to play.

528
00:29:56.839 --> 00:29:59.880
Right, Actually it's in all three acts because oh y,

529
00:30:00.279 --> 00:30:03.240
he has a snake of rama. Lady, check the hoses,

530
00:30:03.519 --> 00:30:05.319
or at least he says, check the hoses, and then

531
00:30:05.359 --> 00:30:07.920
shortly after that they almost get run down. But you

532
00:30:07.920 --> 00:30:10.799
know that's I don't think she ever gets to check

533
00:30:10.799 --> 00:30:11.279
the hoses.

534
00:30:11.440 --> 00:30:14.119
Well, this film has a lot of inner dialogue, and man,

535
00:30:14.240 --> 00:30:17.480
I note before you've talked about inner dialogue with relationship

536
00:30:17.559 --> 00:30:20.400
to movie like Dune. Does this work because he's the

537
00:30:20.400 --> 00:30:21.359
only guy in the car.

538
00:30:22.359 --> 00:30:27.799
Well, you never know. You just never know. You just

539
00:30:27.799 --> 00:30:32.599
go along figuring some things don't change ever, like being

540
00:30:32.640 --> 00:30:35.359
able to drive on a public highway without somebody trying

541
00:30:35.359 --> 00:30:41.920
to murder. Yet, and then one stupid thing happens twenty

542
00:30:41.960 --> 00:30:45.519
twenty five minutes out of your whole life, and all

543
00:30:45.559 --> 00:30:48.200
the ropes that kept you hanging in there get cut loose,

544
00:30:49.640 --> 00:30:53.119
and it's like there you are, right back in the

545
00:30:53.240 --> 00:30:58.960
jungle again. All right, boy, it was a night Marember,

546
00:30:59.000 --> 00:30:59.720
it's over now.

547
00:31:00.279 --> 00:31:04.480
I felt that there could have been a better way

548
00:31:04.519 --> 00:31:06.759
to do this, but based on the fact that it

549
00:31:06.799 --> 00:31:09.599
was a TV film being filmed in thirteen days with

550
00:31:09.839 --> 00:31:12.960
limited technical support and things like that. It's probably the

551
00:31:13.000 --> 00:31:16.240
best way to get the inner conflict out into the

552
00:31:16.319 --> 00:31:20.039
open without having to put more payphones along the road

553
00:31:20.079 --> 00:31:22.000
where you can talk to his wife and tell her

554
00:31:22.000 --> 00:31:24.599
what's happening and tell her what he's planning. And it

555
00:31:24.599 --> 00:31:27.200
would have made the movie too long in terms of minutes,

556
00:31:27.519 --> 00:31:31.720
because again we're trying to fit into a TV movie timeframe.

557
00:31:32.000 --> 00:31:33.960
So I think it was really the only answer, and

558
00:31:34.319 --> 00:31:37.119
it works because you at least get a peek into

559
00:31:37.240 --> 00:31:38.279
what he's thinking.

560
00:31:38.480 --> 00:31:41.119
The other reason why we can relate to this is

561
00:31:41.319 --> 00:31:44.759
it's a simple premise. Who has not been on the

562
00:31:44.839 --> 00:31:48.319
highway and you're either afraid of the traffic that's coming on,

563
00:31:48.519 --> 00:31:51.079
or maybe you're a little worried about that truck that's

564
00:31:51.200 --> 00:31:53.400
riding up closer. It doesn't have to be a truck,

565
00:31:53.440 --> 00:31:55.319
it can be anybody. I mean, it's going to be

566
00:31:55.400 --> 00:31:58.200
years before the term road rage is invented, but I

567
00:31:58.240 --> 00:32:01.519
think all of us today who've been in that situation

568
00:32:01.799 --> 00:32:04.400
can relate to the main character of this story.

569
00:32:04.680 --> 00:32:08.160
Oh one hundred percent. It's definitely very relatable. I will

570
00:32:08.160 --> 00:32:11.119
say there was a bit of a frustration because one

571
00:32:11.160 --> 00:32:13.039
of the things is like and you brought it up

572
00:32:13.039 --> 00:32:16.160
because you compare kind of the similar type of thing

573
00:32:16.240 --> 00:32:21.400
with Jaws, right as the shark being the truck, Well,

574
00:32:21.640 --> 00:32:24.759
the shark in the truck and you're in the shark's

575
00:32:25.200 --> 00:32:28.880
environment with the boat and you have a maniacal captain

576
00:32:28.920 --> 00:32:33.039
who won't leave the ocean. Right. Sure, in this case,

577
00:32:33.200 --> 00:32:35.240
David ban needed to just turn around and go the

578
00:32:35.279 --> 00:32:37.359
other way. He wasn't going to make a sales meeting,

579
00:32:37.599 --> 00:32:39.839
that was clear. I think this movie would have been

580
00:32:39.920 --> 00:32:43.359
better if he had turned around and the truck continued

581
00:32:43.359 --> 00:32:45.200
to follow him, because it would have shown that he

582
00:32:45.720 --> 00:32:49.119
had no escape. Right At My point is it goes

583
00:32:49.160 --> 00:32:50.920
on and on and on and he never even tries

584
00:32:50.960 --> 00:32:53.680
to disengage or drive to the nearest police station.

585
00:32:53.960 --> 00:32:56.640
Hey, but you know what, you bring a really good

586
00:32:56.880 --> 00:33:00.519
connection point. You actually talk about the same in a

587
00:33:00.559 --> 00:33:04.079
way of Jaws. That came to my mind. At the

588
00:33:04.200 --> 00:33:07.400
end of Jaws, the shark has pulled the orca, right,

589
00:33:07.680 --> 00:33:10.079
and so there's all the salt water that's inside the

590
00:33:10.200 --> 00:33:14.119
orca's engine and they're trying to bring the orca into

591
00:33:14.160 --> 00:33:16.400
the shallows where they're going to drown them right, and

592
00:33:16.440 --> 00:33:19.279
this is where finally the Orca grinds to the halt

593
00:33:19.359 --> 00:33:22.799
and they ultimately put Dreyfus into the cave. So in

594
00:33:22.880 --> 00:33:27.039
the scene where the radiator hose, he's trying to get

595
00:33:27.039 --> 00:33:30.119
to this pass because he figures that he can get

596
00:33:30.200 --> 00:33:32.920
to this pass, the truck won't be able to catch

597
00:33:32.960 --> 00:33:35.920
him and he'll be able to escape on the other side. However,

598
00:33:35.960 --> 00:33:38.640
that's when the radiator hose. That's when the bomb goes

599
00:33:38.680 --> 00:33:40.640
off and you see all the smoke. So to me,

600
00:33:40.720 --> 00:33:44.039
I was like going, ooh, that little red Valiant car

601
00:33:44.359 --> 00:33:46.960
just starts to spew smoke so much like what the

602
00:33:47.079 --> 00:33:51.359
Orca does. It's just kind of grinding down. That Valiant

603
00:33:51.359 --> 00:33:54.559
car was truly valiant. I mean, even after the radiator

604
00:33:54.599 --> 00:33:57.079
has has exploded, he still gets gets.

605
00:33:56.839 --> 00:33:58.680
A lot of it gets over the head.

606
00:34:00.440 --> 00:34:02.759
And Yeah, we were looking at it and my wife said, oh,

607
00:34:02.759 --> 00:34:05.000
he put it in neutral, but wasn't the steering wheel

608
00:34:05.079 --> 00:34:06.720
lock up. I'm going to assume that it.

609
00:34:06.839 --> 00:34:10.440
No, No, the steering wheel lock is on the key

610
00:34:10.800 --> 00:34:13.840
ah and neutral is neutral. Now she put it in park,

611
00:34:13.880 --> 00:34:16.199
and she may have confused that with putting it in park,

612
00:34:16.280 --> 00:34:19.960
which does engage the lock, so neutral's fine. In fact,

613
00:34:20.039 --> 00:34:21.679
I was surprised that he didn't reach down to turn

614
00:34:21.760 --> 00:34:23.280
the engine off to let it cool off.

615
00:34:23.360 --> 00:34:26.920
But oh yeah, that was There's lots of a panic

616
00:34:27.119 --> 00:34:29.480
that happens in this film beginning. One of the things too,

617
00:34:29.639 --> 00:34:33.039
it's not going to strike people funny today. But when

618
00:34:33.039 --> 00:34:34.840
he gets in the car near the end and he

619
00:34:35.119 --> 00:34:39.000
puts the seat belt on right like, I mean business now,

620
00:34:39.360 --> 00:34:43.320
it's like, because nobody wore seat belts in the seventies,

621
00:34:43.639 --> 00:34:45.760
it was unusual to put your seat belt on.

622
00:34:45.840 --> 00:34:46.800
It's crazy for me.

623
00:34:47.159 --> 00:34:50.800
The most seventies thing of this whole movie. How about

624
00:34:50.880 --> 00:34:54.880
David Mann's glasses. Those sunglasses were perfect. I want a

625
00:34:54.880 --> 00:34:59.800
pair of those sunglasses right now. Yeah, eat them. They're great.

626
00:35:00.159 --> 00:35:01.760
Oh yeah, they're so great.

627
00:35:02.039 --> 00:35:02.360
Definitely.

628
00:35:02.519 --> 00:35:06.079
Kerrie Loughton, I said, had worked previously on Bullet. Also

629
00:35:06.599 --> 00:35:10.760
on Bullet was a small camera car that they had

630
00:35:10.800 --> 00:35:14.239
built that sat about six inches above the ground so

631
00:35:14.280 --> 00:35:16.639
that they could put a camera in it and then

632
00:35:16.880 --> 00:35:19.400
track with the various cars in Bullet. That's what makes

633
00:35:19.480 --> 00:35:22.519
those scenes with the car chases so good. And Spielberg

634
00:35:22.719 --> 00:35:25.599
uses this the same car in Duel, and that's how

635
00:35:25.639 --> 00:35:29.000
he's getting all those low shots where he pans from

636
00:35:29.039 --> 00:35:32.280
like first he's beside Dennis Weaver, and then it accelerates

637
00:35:32.320 --> 00:35:34.119
and you're now in front of the truck. Like you

638
00:35:34.159 --> 00:35:38.320
were describing, You're already starting to see Spielberg develop his

639
00:35:38.599 --> 00:35:42.679
own cinematic language that he has, and talking about the

640
00:35:42.719 --> 00:35:46.519
pacing a little bit, it does seem to have built

641
00:35:46.559 --> 00:35:51.920
in pauses, whether it's little points along the way. I

642
00:35:52.000 --> 00:35:56.039
felt that there were some sequences in the movie version

643
00:35:56.360 --> 00:35:58.800
that brought it down a little bit too much. What

644
00:35:58.880 --> 00:35:59.519
did you think?

645
00:35:59.679 --> 00:36:02.880
Yeah, I think that it was handled well because you know,

646
00:36:03.079 --> 00:36:05.679
the normal situation will be a car can outrun a truck.

647
00:36:05.719 --> 00:36:08.199
I mean, we've all been in a car going up uninclined.

648
00:36:08.239 --> 00:36:09.760
The car is going to make it up the incline.

649
00:36:09.800 --> 00:36:13.400
The truck is shifting down into lower gears and creeping over.

650
00:36:13.480 --> 00:36:15.519
Now on the other side, they're going to come barreling

651
00:36:15.559 --> 00:36:17.599
down because they want to make up that time and

652
00:36:17.639 --> 00:36:20.079
the energy and stuff. But with the car, you're definitely

653
00:36:20.079 --> 00:36:22.239
going to outpace him. So in the movie you see

654
00:36:22.239 --> 00:36:25.079
that he outpaces the truck. He thinks, yeah'm done, you know,

655
00:36:25.519 --> 00:36:27.400
and he pulls in and then the next thing you know,

656
00:36:27.519 --> 00:36:30.880
the truck comes barreling up, which is great because it's like, oh,

657
00:36:30.920 --> 00:36:34.039
all right, he's okaya. Oh nope, here's the truck again.

658
00:36:34.119 --> 00:36:37.920
So there's that pause that helps relieve the tension and

659
00:36:37.960 --> 00:36:40.480
then immediately start to build it again, right, because you

660
00:36:40.519 --> 00:36:43.440
can't just have tension tension, tension, tension, intention people will

661
00:36:43.480 --> 00:36:46.039
fatigue at that tension level and it will be no

662
00:36:46.079 --> 00:36:48.920
longer interesting because it just sits there at that high

663
00:36:49.000 --> 00:36:51.599
level until the ultimate resolution at the end of the movie.

664
00:36:51.599 --> 00:36:53.320
People would just get bored and turn it off. You

665
00:36:53.360 --> 00:36:55.280
have to relieve it and then build it again, just

666
00:36:55.320 --> 00:36:57.519
like I think, now you can. You can help me

667
00:36:57.559 --> 00:36:58.039
with this, Chuck.

668
00:36:58.159 --> 00:36:58.480
Sure.

669
00:36:58.519 --> 00:37:02.440
I think the same thing happens in music. Build. You

670
00:37:02.559 --> 00:37:04.960
build tension in the music, then you release it. Then

671
00:37:05.000 --> 00:37:07.079
you build, and then then you release it, and then

672
00:37:07.119 --> 00:37:10.320
you build to a crescendo, and that makes it much better.

673
00:37:10.400 --> 00:37:12.360
Right, Matt, you're speaking my language.

674
00:37:12.400 --> 00:37:14.599
I figured it would be something you would do about

675
00:37:15.119 --> 00:37:17.280
So I think you're right. And what you're pointing out

676
00:37:17.400 --> 00:37:21.639
is in the theatrical release they put some more of

677
00:37:21.679 --> 00:37:25.079
that tension breaking that is a little bit longer and

678
00:37:25.239 --> 00:37:29.719
maybe stretch the movie time out, right, But maybe didn't

679
00:37:29.760 --> 00:37:32.599
help that pacing, but I don't hate it. We know

680
00:37:32.719 --> 00:37:35.719
that in the theatrical release there's the whole bus scene

681
00:37:35.760 --> 00:37:38.000
with the children in the bus and him trying to

682
00:37:38.159 --> 00:37:40.519
push the bus and a bunch of stuff, and then

683
00:37:40.559 --> 00:37:43.840
the truck actually saving the day to help the bus.

684
00:37:44.119 --> 00:37:46.400
All of that kind of brings a lot of nuance

685
00:37:46.480 --> 00:37:50.480
into the idea of maybe this truck driver isn't all bad,

686
00:37:50.800 --> 00:37:54.000
or maybe he has a soft spot for children. Who

687
00:37:54.039 --> 00:37:57.119
knows what it is, but it clearly puts in some questions,

688
00:37:57.480 --> 00:37:59.599
which is a good thing, right. I will say though,

689
00:37:59.599 --> 00:38:02.599
that I think in the theatrical release the version of the

690
00:38:02.639 --> 00:38:06.360
movie I watched, the entire first few minutes was like

691
00:38:06.400 --> 00:38:09.960
a POV. It was just the front of his car

692
00:38:10.400 --> 00:38:12.880
from his driving position right right right.

693
00:38:12.920 --> 00:38:16.480
It was a car at that level of his bumper.

694
00:38:16.320 --> 00:38:20.039
Yeah, and just driving through the neighborhood and no words

695
00:38:20.079 --> 00:38:22.639
at all are being spoken. That was a pretty cool

696
00:38:22.719 --> 00:38:24.679
way to start out the movie. But I don't believe

697
00:38:24.719 --> 00:38:27.280
that happened in the TV release, and I don't think

698
00:38:27.320 --> 00:38:29.480
it would have been well received in the TV release

699
00:38:29.559 --> 00:38:33.760
because you're not and I think there's this probably if

700
00:38:33.800 --> 00:38:36.320
if we had Steven Spielberg gone, We asked him, he'd

701
00:38:36.320 --> 00:38:39.320
probably say, you have to capture your TV audience in

702
00:38:39.360 --> 00:38:43.039
the first five minutes or they are gone, right, and Mike,

703
00:38:43.320 --> 00:38:46.480
unlike a movie theater where you have a certain amount

704
00:38:46.480 --> 00:38:48.719
of grace because you've paid a ticket and you're sitting

705
00:38:48.719 --> 00:38:51.159
in a seat, you're gonna give it more time before

706
00:38:51.199 --> 00:38:53.400
you absolutely just get up. And I think with a

707
00:38:53.480 --> 00:38:55.760
TV you change the channel, you get up and do

708
00:38:55.840 --> 00:38:58.280
something else. So I think you have to capture him sooner.

709
00:38:58.400 --> 00:39:00.800
We need to take a quick break, but we'll be right.

710
00:39:00.599 --> 00:39:10.360
Back and flash back, welcome back. Why do you think

711
00:39:10.400 --> 00:39:13.320
this truck works so well as a monster? Well, it's

712
00:39:13.559 --> 00:39:16.679
it looks like a monster. It's very dingy. It's covered

713
00:39:16.679 --> 00:39:21.119
in oil, and it's not exactly rusty. It's just dark, right, yeah,

714
00:39:21.440 --> 00:39:24.719
just dark everywhere. It's like brown, right, yeah.

715
00:39:24.519 --> 00:39:28.119
It's like a dirty brown, but not dirty oil streaked.

716
00:39:28.440 --> 00:39:31.679
Yeah. Yeah, obviously the truck sat in the makeup chair.

717
00:39:32.000 --> 00:39:34.440
You make them intimidating, right, It.

718
00:39:34.480 --> 00:39:38.559
Needed was a big, snidely whip black mustache on the front.

719
00:39:39.239 --> 00:39:42.119
You have David Man's car is a is a It's

720
00:39:42.159 --> 00:39:45.800
called a Valiant. I don't recall the manufacture of the

721
00:39:45.880 --> 00:39:48.320
value Plymouth I think was it a Plymouth value? I

722
00:39:48.320 --> 00:39:51.639
think you're right, Yeah, I think you're right. Spielberg wanted

723
00:39:51.639 --> 00:39:53.519
a red car, right, and so that you would have

724
00:39:53.559 --> 00:39:57.679
these nice distinctions between the truck and his car. Now.

725
00:39:57.760 --> 00:40:01.840
I think we've talked about previous how much we liked

726
00:40:02.039 --> 00:40:04.920
the Mad Max series. Am I remembering that right? Yeah?

727
00:40:04.920 --> 00:40:06.719
Well, I'm sure because I would have definitely said I

728
00:40:06.800 --> 00:40:07.360
liked him a lot.

729
00:40:07.480 --> 00:40:13.199
Well. The camera movements in Duel directly influenced George Miller

730
00:40:13.519 --> 00:40:16.599
and how he set up his roadshots. Every time I

731
00:40:16.599 --> 00:40:19.519
would see the camera start up high and it's the

732
00:40:19.599 --> 00:40:22.079
truck is tracking in front, and then the camera would

733
00:40:22.119 --> 00:40:24.760
kind of dolly in and come down low in front

734
00:40:24.800 --> 00:40:26.719
of the truck as and you're kind of focus on

735
00:40:26.760 --> 00:40:29.280
the grill and on the headlights. I'm just sitting there

736
00:40:29.320 --> 00:40:31.679
thinking to myself, this looks like Mad Max to me.

737
00:40:31.960 --> 00:40:34.119
Well, the other thing that will remind you of Mad

738
00:40:34.199 --> 00:40:38.280
Max is the liberal use of speeding up the frames, oh,

739
00:40:38.320 --> 00:40:40.960
to make it look like things are going faster, and

740
00:40:40.960 --> 00:40:43.400
that was used all through Mad Bax. You're like, wait,

741
00:40:43.880 --> 00:40:46.320
that's the wind is not blowing the same it was

742
00:40:46.360 --> 00:40:48.880
blowing before, and they do that in this film. But they,

743
00:40:49.079 --> 00:40:52.119
I have to say, Steven Spielberg used to a deaf hand

744
00:40:52.320 --> 00:40:56.000
with this, and only in very small shots can you

745
00:40:56.079 --> 00:40:59.360
detect that the truck isn't really going seventy miles an

746
00:40:59.400 --> 00:41:02.119
hour but thirty five at two times the frame rate

747
00:41:02.199 --> 00:41:02.639
or whatever.

748
00:41:02.880 --> 00:41:05.480
Now, Spielberg, in order to get it done in such

749
00:41:05.519 --> 00:41:08.480
a short timeframe, they had a block of road that

750
00:41:08.519 --> 00:41:11.559
they were able to use. It was enough road to

751
00:41:11.599 --> 00:41:14.840
where he could film going one way and then set

752
00:41:14.880 --> 00:41:17.519
the crew up and then go the other way. Genius,

753
00:41:17.840 --> 00:41:20.239
and it would look like a completely different road because

754
00:41:20.280 --> 00:41:22.480
now you're seeing the other side. I thought that was brilliant.

755
00:41:22.559 --> 00:41:24.480
I usually can pick up on those sorts of things,

756
00:41:24.559 --> 00:41:26.440
as I'll see the same thing go by on a

757
00:41:26.519 --> 00:41:29.000
road that went by before, because I typically try to

758
00:41:29.039 --> 00:41:31.039
notice those things. I did not notice on this film.

759
00:41:31.079 --> 00:41:32.400
So he did a wonderful job on that.

760
00:41:32.480 --> 00:41:35.039
To finish up talking about this truck, I think they

761
00:41:35.159 --> 00:41:39.480
gave this truck a big personality. In the end, when

762
00:41:39.519 --> 00:41:42.960
the truck goes over the side of the ledge and

763
00:41:43.000 --> 00:41:45.519
it's in its death throes, I don't know if you

764
00:41:45.599 --> 00:41:49.760
picked up on its death scream. It's almost a primal

765
00:41:50.239 --> 00:41:53.679
sound of a beast. Yeah, it was like a.

766
00:41:59.519 --> 00:42:02.280
The most thing I noticed was that the driver's side

767
00:42:02.320 --> 00:42:05.800
door was open. Well, we saw that too as well,

768
00:42:06.599 --> 00:42:09.599
but yeah, no, I definitely heard that sound of wrenching

769
00:42:09.679 --> 00:42:13.599
metal with an overtone of something organic. That same sound

770
00:42:13.599 --> 00:42:17.519
effect was used in Jaws when the shark exploded and

771
00:42:17.559 --> 00:42:21.840
the carcass was going down inside a cloud of blood,

772
00:42:21.920 --> 00:42:29.760
and you heard that same sound of everything. That works

773
00:42:30.079 --> 00:42:34.039
better in the theatrical version. That scene works better because

774
00:42:34.079 --> 00:42:37.000
you have the expanded screen on the side and you

775
00:42:37.079 --> 00:42:40.559
see way more of that truck flipping over, and it's great.

776
00:42:40.920 --> 00:42:43.840
We didn't get our big kaboom with the flame, but

777
00:42:43.880 --> 00:42:47.199
I think we got a great death. David Mann is

778
00:42:47.280 --> 00:42:50.719
waiting to see if the driver comes out, and eventually

779
00:42:50.760 --> 00:42:53.960
Stephen teases us for a little bit until he shows

780
00:42:54.039 --> 00:42:56.679
us the blood dripping from the steering wheel, letting us

781
00:42:56.719 --> 00:42:59.639
know that the killer is dead or is he.

782
00:43:00.239 --> 00:43:00.760
I don't know.

783
00:43:00.960 --> 00:43:04.719
I don't believe it, knowing what we now know about Spielberg,

784
00:43:05.039 --> 00:43:08.400
I think we could make an argument that maybe he

785
00:43:08.440 --> 00:43:10.880
didn't know it at the time, But Duel was a

786
00:43:10.960 --> 00:43:14.239
dress rehearsal for Jaws in much the same way that

787
00:43:14.559 --> 00:43:17.440
many of the elements of THHX eleven thirty eight we

788
00:43:17.480 --> 00:43:20.679
would see echo again in Star Wars. What do you

789
00:43:20.719 --> 00:43:21.360
think about that?

790
00:43:21.719 --> 00:43:24.679
I agree. I think you definitely can see some of

791
00:43:24.719 --> 00:43:29.400
the parallels between Jaws and Duel. I mean, certainly on

792
00:43:29.440 --> 00:43:32.400
a smaller scale, not a large cast of a bunch

793
00:43:32.440 --> 00:43:36.559
of people moving, but definitely this every man battles the monster.

794
00:43:36.880 --> 00:43:40.920
You have the policeman in the little town of Amity,

795
00:43:41.159 --> 00:43:43.920
and do you have David Mann doing battle with this

796
00:43:44.440 --> 00:43:47.719
big truck. I think there's some argument to be made

797
00:43:47.719 --> 00:43:49.639
in this that you could have just turned around and left,

798
00:43:49.679 --> 00:43:51.800
But I like to believe that he tried to do

799
00:43:51.840 --> 00:43:55.599
that and it still was following him, so right right, I.

800
00:43:55.639 --> 00:43:58.519
Think it still would have chased him down, because one

801
00:43:58.559 --> 00:44:00.880
of the things with this truck that made it insidious

802
00:44:01.000 --> 00:44:02.760
was that David did some of the things that I

803
00:44:02.800 --> 00:44:04.760
would have thought about. Hey, let's just pull over to

804
00:44:05.079 --> 00:44:09.920
the world's greatest diner. Yeah right, Chuck's Diner still there?

805
00:44:10.039 --> 00:44:14.360
Still there, dude. One day we're gonna have to make

806
00:44:14.400 --> 00:44:14.920
a road trip.

807
00:44:15.199 --> 00:44:16.719
Yeah, that would be fun. We got to add an

808
00:44:16.719 --> 00:44:18.679
East Coast movie. Then we have to drive so far.

809
00:44:18.840 --> 00:44:22.320
Yeah, I think it's fun to watch the theatrical version,

810
00:44:22.320 --> 00:44:25.480
which is much easier to watch, and the smaller screen version,

811
00:44:25.519 --> 00:44:28.920
which is definitely there's no fluff in it, right, it's

812
00:44:29.039 --> 00:44:33.760
it's bam bam bam. It's all action. The only scene

813
00:44:33.800 --> 00:44:37.840
of release is at Chuck's Diner, a little bit of trivia,

814
00:44:38.320 --> 00:44:41.960
the scene where Dennis Weavers spins out and hits that

815
00:44:42.000 --> 00:44:44.960
white fence in front of the diner that was reused

816
00:44:45.079 --> 00:44:50.840
in another very popular nineteen seventies television show, The Incredible Hultrill.

817
00:44:50.960 --> 00:44:54.360
They lifted that scene directly put it in, much to

818
00:44:54.440 --> 00:44:56.480
the chagrin of Spielberg, who.

819
00:44:56.320 --> 00:44:58.880
I was going to say it clearly can't imagine him

820
00:44:58.880 --> 00:44:59.840
being okay with that.

821
00:45:00.039 --> 00:45:03.000
He was definitely not happy about that.

822
00:45:03.280 --> 00:45:05.599
Yeah, I'm sure it made it into whatever riders he

823
00:45:05.679 --> 00:45:09.880
had later foul shout, not use my films.

824
00:45:10.079 --> 00:45:12.400
One last thing, and I didn't know if you put

825
00:45:12.440 --> 00:45:16.000
this together or not. The final scene of THCHX eleven

826
00:45:16.079 --> 00:45:19.960
thirty eight is when THCHX is finally gotten outside of

827
00:45:19.960 --> 00:45:22.840
the city underground City, and he is now standing in

828
00:45:22.840 --> 00:45:26.400
front of the sun. The final shot of duel is

829
00:45:26.519 --> 00:45:29.719
David Mann sitting down in front of a setting Sun

830
00:45:29.800 --> 00:45:33.400
as It's going Down. Two directors who had their first

831
00:45:33.440 --> 00:45:38.599
movies end nearly in the same identical thematic way. Their

832
00:45:38.679 --> 00:45:43.079
next film would be Sugarland Express for Spielberg. George Lucas's

833
00:45:43.079 --> 00:45:46.000
next film would be American Graffiti, which was a very

834
00:45:46.039 --> 00:45:49.800
big hit. But the films both directors would do next

835
00:45:50.000 --> 00:45:55.360
would cement them forever in movie history. Of course, George

836
00:45:55.400 --> 00:45:58.840
Lucas comes out with Star Wars. Steven Spielberg comes out

837
00:45:58.840 --> 00:46:03.159
with Jaws. Everything about them that we ever need to know,

838
00:46:03.599 --> 00:46:07.639
as started in these early origin stories that we got

839
00:46:07.639 --> 00:46:10.079
a chance to cover Matt, it's time to ask the

840
00:46:10.239 --> 00:46:14.079
question does Dual groove through the decades or has it

841
00:46:14.119 --> 00:46:14.840
lost its beat?

842
00:46:15.119 --> 00:46:18.400
So this was a tough one for me because, like

843
00:46:18.440 --> 00:46:21.119
I said, I did not see it in the nineteen seventies,

844
00:46:21.199 --> 00:46:23.920
and I watched the theatrical release, which is a little

845
00:46:24.000 --> 00:46:27.480
unfair since it was released originally for the TV. But

846
00:46:27.679 --> 00:46:30.639
I won't be honest with you. I enjoyed it. I

847
00:46:30.760 --> 00:46:33.360
did enjoy it. I really liked it. I think it's

848
00:46:33.400 --> 00:46:36.559
well worth seeing. I think with the added color of

849
00:46:36.599 --> 00:46:41.239
it being Steven Spielberg's first kind of real movie. Even

850
00:46:41.239 --> 00:46:43.320
though it was a small budget for a small screen

851
00:46:43.519 --> 00:46:47.559
with a small timeframe. I think given those challenges and

852
00:46:47.639 --> 00:46:50.679
what he comes out with is a real eye opener.

853
00:46:50.760 --> 00:46:54.960
And clearly the studio must have been like, ah, we

854
00:46:55.119 --> 00:46:57.920
got a hot one. Oh yeah, this guy knows what's happening,

855
00:46:58.079 --> 00:47:00.519
you know, because this was a great movie shot in

856
00:47:00.599 --> 00:47:04.440
thirteen days. The budget was probably minuscule, and you know,

857
00:47:04.559 --> 00:47:06.880
yes it was made for TV. But I guarantee you

858
00:47:06.920 --> 00:47:10.920
people in their living rooms were riveted to this because

859
00:47:10.960 --> 00:47:14.119
it was a good movie, good pacing, good like all

860
00:47:14.159 --> 00:47:16.400
the things we talked about about, the suspense and the

861
00:47:16.440 --> 00:47:19.159
things like that. So I think, yes, it grooves. I

862
00:47:19.280 --> 00:47:21.519
enjoyed it. I think if you're a fan of Steven

863
00:47:21.599 --> 00:47:25.360
Spielberg's this is a must watch. You should definitely watch

864
00:47:25.400 --> 00:47:29.400
this because it will really help you appreciate the strides

865
00:47:29.440 --> 00:47:34.199
he took, but the kernel of genius that was already there.

866
00:47:34.519 --> 00:47:36.679
Is it the greatest movie that's ever been filmed? No,

867
00:47:36.920 --> 00:47:38.440
not by any stretch of the imagine it is the

868
00:47:38.440 --> 00:47:41.880
greatest movie of the seventies, No, not anywhere close. Is

869
00:47:41.920 --> 00:47:44.800
it something that should be in your repertoire if you

870
00:47:44.840 --> 00:47:48.960
want to speak semi intelligently about Steven Spielberg and his

871
00:47:49.039 --> 00:47:52.119
later films, and I think, yeah, it absolutely, you should

872
00:47:52.159 --> 00:47:54.239
definitely see it. I'm actually a little ashamed that I

873
00:47:54.280 --> 00:47:57.920
haven't seen it till till now. So dear listeners, I

874
00:47:57.960 --> 00:48:00.440
will call out to you and say, I make it

875
00:48:00.480 --> 00:48:02.760
your task. If you have not seen Duel, you should

876
00:48:02.760 --> 00:48:06.360
watch it and you will enjoy it. And that's about

877
00:48:06.360 --> 00:48:07.480
all I have to say about that.

878
00:48:07.800 --> 00:48:11.880
Okay, Forrest, so go ahead.

879
00:48:12.199 --> 00:48:15.400
That's about all I have to say about that. Now, Chuck,

880
00:48:15.519 --> 00:48:18.559
I have the feeling that you have something to say

881
00:48:18.599 --> 00:48:20.880
about this, and I think it's probably positive.

882
00:48:21.320 --> 00:48:23.920
You know, I tend to be very positive in a

883
00:48:23.960 --> 00:48:27.599
lot of films. It's very hard for me to spend

884
00:48:27.639 --> 00:48:31.400
time with a movie and spend time with how how

885
00:48:31.440 --> 00:48:34.960
that film came to be, and it's sometimes it's hard

886
00:48:35.000 --> 00:48:37.760
to look at it critically because you begin to understand

887
00:48:38.039 --> 00:48:41.840
the constraints in which film was being made at that time.

888
00:48:42.079 --> 00:48:44.280
And you know, we've been taking a look at these

889
00:48:44.280 --> 00:48:47.760
two origin stories with George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, and

890
00:48:47.800 --> 00:48:50.960
for me, both of them are just really incredible directors.

891
00:48:51.199 --> 00:48:54.639
They're incredible artists, but each had a different approach. Now,

892
00:48:54.760 --> 00:48:58.400
Lucas was coming from the Film School of usc he

893
00:48:58.639 --> 00:49:02.480
was working with a major studio. He had major studio

894
00:49:02.639 --> 00:49:05.800
money to be able to do THCHX eleven thirty eight,

895
00:49:06.039 --> 00:49:11.119
and to some degree, he had a bit of ambition

896
00:49:11.639 --> 00:49:14.840
because he wanted to make this movie THCHX eleven thirty

897
00:49:14.840 --> 00:49:17.400
eight in the way that he wanted to make it,

898
00:49:17.679 --> 00:49:21.119
and the result was a film that nobody really could

899
00:49:21.119 --> 00:49:25.000
relate to. Spielberg, on the other hand, was given an

900
00:49:25.039 --> 00:49:29.119
opportunity to move from directing television shows to directing and

901
00:49:29.159 --> 00:49:32.280
made for TV movie. I believe he made the most

902
00:49:32.320 --> 00:49:35.719
of it. He even went against advice. He didn't want

903
00:49:35.760 --> 00:49:38.639
to film this at the studio using rear projection. He

904
00:49:38.760 --> 00:49:42.119
wanted to film it on the road because that would

905
00:49:42.159 --> 00:49:45.800
look more real. And he made the same decision with Jaws.

906
00:49:46.039 --> 00:49:49.639
Filming on the open ocean looks more real and more

907
00:49:49.719 --> 00:49:53.920
convincing than the studio water tank. And what Spielberg turned

908
00:49:53.920 --> 00:49:58.599
in was not your ordinary TV movie. Cinema had a language,

909
00:49:58.679 --> 00:50:02.360
but Spielberg's movie have their own language, and it was

910
00:50:02.400 --> 00:50:06.000
being developed in dual Spielberg connected with the audience at

911
00:50:06.039 --> 00:50:08.400
a primal level in a way that I don't think

912
00:50:08.480 --> 00:50:12.960
Lucas did. It's not that I didn't like THCHX eleven

913
00:50:13.079 --> 00:50:17.079
thirty eight, but I can understand that that movie is

914
00:50:17.159 --> 00:50:21.159
going to have very limited appeal. Duel doesn't suffer from that.

915
00:50:21.440 --> 00:50:23.480
You can show it to anyone and they are going

916
00:50:23.559 --> 00:50:26.760
to connect to the plight of David Mann. So yeah,

917
00:50:26.800 --> 00:50:30.199
for me, Dual grooves Mad. Did you have any final thoughts?

918
00:50:30.440 --> 00:50:33.280
Yeah, I would say that, as usual, you were able

919
00:50:33.320 --> 00:50:36.239
to put that into words much better than I was,

920
00:50:36.320 --> 00:50:39.760
and I agree one hundred percent. I did not care

921
00:50:39.800 --> 00:50:42.880
for TCHX eleven thirty eight very much. I think it was,

922
00:50:43.000 --> 00:50:46.039
like you said, interesting to watch as a development of

923
00:50:46.119 --> 00:50:50.920
George lucas As film unto itself. Man, right, it's a film.

924
00:50:51.159 --> 00:50:53.760
It's a work. Yeah, it's a work. But this film

925
00:50:54.079 --> 00:50:56.920
it was entertaining and it was exciting, and it was

926
00:50:57.039 --> 00:50:59.559
it was fun to watch. It was not it was

927
00:50:59.559 --> 00:51:01.840
an ad. So yeah, I one hundred percent agree with you.

928
00:51:01.920 --> 00:51:06.719
I think it proves I think that really differentiates Spielberg

929
00:51:06.880 --> 00:51:11.159
and Lucas individually. I think I think Lucas tends to

930
00:51:11.760 --> 00:51:16.239
he's more concerned with how a film is made, you know,

931
00:51:16.280 --> 00:51:20.800
whether it's how the sound and or the cameras say

932
00:51:20.800 --> 00:51:24.599
what you will. The impact that George Lucas has had

933
00:51:24.719 --> 00:51:29.960
on movie technology is just it's beyond anything. I mean,

934
00:51:30.079 --> 00:51:33.320
what we have today in our movie theaters are all

935
00:51:33.360 --> 00:51:37.159
directly responsible by George Lucas in one way or another.

936
00:51:37.239 --> 00:51:40.880
You can you can trace it all back to George Lucas. Spielberg,

937
00:51:41.000 --> 00:51:44.960
on the other hand, always knows that you're connecting with

938
00:51:45.079 --> 00:51:49.079
an audience. And what makes Raiders of the Lost Art

939
00:51:49.440 --> 00:51:52.599
so good is that it's the combination of these two

940
00:51:52.639 --> 00:51:57.880
guys coming together and making arguably one of the most

941
00:51:57.920 --> 00:52:01.199
exciting trilogy of movies of the nineteen eighties.

942
00:52:01.519 --> 00:52:03.960
Yeah, I was going to say, maybe it had something

943
00:52:03.960 --> 00:52:07.719
to do with George Lucas being a film studio a

944
00:52:07.800 --> 00:52:12.920
student right, a studied film and Steven Spielberg being an

945
00:52:12.960 --> 00:52:16.320
English major who basically gets pulled out of college. And

946
00:52:16.559 --> 00:52:20.079
absolutely so you have someone who is story focused and

947
00:52:20.719 --> 00:52:23.159
you know, like we see with Steven Spielberg, and we

948
00:52:23.159 --> 00:52:26.840
see someone who is a little more of the kind

949
00:52:26.920 --> 00:52:31.679
of avant garde filmmaking type of stuff, which I, yeah,

950
00:52:32.239 --> 00:52:34.000
I think makes some difference.

951
00:52:34.119 --> 00:52:37.920
So yeah, can I even go further back to even

952
00:52:37.960 --> 00:52:41.400
illustrate the same difference you just said when George Lucas

953
00:52:41.519 --> 00:52:44.559
was growing up, he was into cars, so he was

954
00:52:44.800 --> 00:52:46.880
he was a mechanic on cars. He was souping up

955
00:52:46.920 --> 00:52:53.360
cars for racing. He's very engineered minded, right, Spielberg was

956
00:52:53.480 --> 00:52:58.159
making movies right, So that right there just shows this

957
00:52:58.360 --> 00:53:02.679
difference between both of the these incredible talent and artist

958
00:53:02.800 --> 00:53:06.840
and directors and influencers right from their Have you seen

959
00:53:06.840 --> 00:53:09.920
the movie The Fablemans. Yes, Yeah, that is a semi

960
00:53:10.000 --> 00:53:14.320
autobiographical movie that Spielberg did that kind of tells a

961
00:53:14.320 --> 00:53:16.679
little bit of the story of things that were in

962
00:53:16.800 --> 00:53:17.760
his youth as well.

963
00:53:18.000 --> 00:53:20.159
Yeah, that's a great that's a great movie, by the way.

964
00:53:20.199 --> 00:53:22.000
I mean, I really enjoyed it. It's a lot of

965
00:53:22.000 --> 00:53:24.639
fun and great actors in it, of course, and kind

966
00:53:24.679 --> 00:53:28.199
of it's a nice like look back on someone's past.

967
00:53:28.239 --> 00:53:31.480
And honestly, we talk a lot about the seventies. That

968
00:53:31.559 --> 00:53:34.039
movie actually has a lot of what do you call

969
00:53:34.079 --> 00:53:37.920
it kitsch from the seventies. That absolutely, the living rooms

970
00:53:37.960 --> 00:53:41.679
and stuff is very well done. And so earlier I

971
00:53:41.719 --> 00:53:45.440
had mentioned how Spielberg was using a lot of techniques

972
00:53:45.480 --> 00:53:47.800
that he had learned from John Ford, or he.

973
00:53:47.760 --> 00:53:50.679
Had learned from Howard Hawks. Howard Hawks was the director

974
00:53:50.719 --> 00:53:52.519
of The Searchers, which you and I are going to

975
00:53:52.599 --> 00:53:56.159
go see together at the Narrow This summer awesome. So

976
00:53:56.360 --> 00:53:59.719
at the end of the Fablemans, the young protagonist is

977
00:53:59.760 --> 00:54:03.400
me john Ford for the first time, and he gets

978
00:54:03.519 --> 00:54:07.639
the he gets the opportunity to work as a movie director,

979
00:54:07.880 --> 00:54:12.199
and he walks out and all is ended. So okay, Matt,

980
00:54:12.280 --> 00:54:15.280
that wraps up our origin stories month. Coming into July,

981
00:54:15.599 --> 00:54:19.559
we're going to keep on trucking with two films that

982
00:54:19.719 --> 00:54:25.079
embraced the nineteen seventies trucking culture and turned eighteen wheels

983
00:54:25.119 --> 00:54:29.920
into symbols of rebellion, survival, and life on the open road.

984
00:54:30.519 --> 00:54:35.039
First up is Jonathan Kaplan's nineteen seventy five film White

985
00:54:35.400 --> 00:54:40.119
Line Fever, a gritty, blue collared action film heavily influenced

986
00:54:40.159 --> 00:54:44.440
by Sam Peckinpah and starring Jan Michael Vincent along with

987
00:54:44.639 --> 00:54:49.480
several familiar Peck and Pop basses, including Slim Pickens, L Q. Jones,

988
00:54:49.559 --> 00:54:53.639
and R. G. Armstrong. Then we're gonna move to Peck

989
00:54:53.719 --> 00:54:57.679
and Pah himself with nineteen seventy eight's Convoy, starring Chris

990
00:54:57.880 --> 00:55:02.280
Christofferson and Ali McGrath, where the trucker movie becomes a

991
00:55:02.360 --> 00:55:06.679
full blown outlaw road epic. Fu'll buy CEBE Radios, Anti

992
00:55:06.760 --> 00:55:11.960
authority energy and just pure seventies Americana. So grab your

993
00:55:12.000 --> 00:55:15.400
CBE Radio, keep the hammer down, and join us for

994
00:55:15.760 --> 00:55:19.559
keep on trucking mop here on the Cinematic Flashbacks ten four.

995
00:55:19.639 --> 00:55:23.320
Good buddy, thanks for tuning in. Let us know what

996
00:55:23.360 --> 00:55:26.159
you thought about Duel. You can reach us at Cinematic

997
00:55:26.199 --> 00:55:29.480
Flashback dot com and don't forget to leave us a

998
00:55:29.559 --> 00:55:32.079
rating and a review. It might just get read on

999
00:55:32.119 --> 00:55:34.760
the air. If you enjoy the show, help us grow

1000
00:55:34.800 --> 00:55:37.679
by sharing it with your friends. Also, if you haven't

1001
00:55:37.719 --> 00:55:40.440
done so already, go ahead and hit the subscribe button.

1002
00:55:40.840 --> 00:55:43.360
That way you'll never miss an episode. And if you're

1003
00:55:43.480 --> 00:55:46.280
one of our listeners on YouTube, thank you and be

1004
00:55:46.400 --> 00:55:50.000
sure to smash that like button and hit subscribe as well.

1005
00:55:50.360 --> 00:55:52.440
Join us next time as we hop back into the

1006
00:55:52.480 --> 00:55:55.599
wayback machine and head once again to the nineteen seventies

1007
00:55:55.599 --> 00:56:01.719
for another classic. See you then, Last Seventies, Stay the

1008
00:56:01.880 --> 00:56:04.480
wign just Little Whiplagus All