Monday, April 8All That Matters

DUEL revisited – Spielberg’s first foray

by LukeWarmLivesOn


DUEL revisited – Spielberg’s first foray




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15 Comments

  • DickiesAndChucks

    One of the first movies I saw that made me think, “A-ha!” in terms of watching and maybe even consuming movies critically and culturally. I was maybe 7 or 8 years old and every couple years I fire it up because it’s just so good.

    Reply
  • rottenweiler

    I read the short story in Playboy a year or so before the movie came out, I thought it was good but I was really impressed by the movie.

    Reply
  • Verpous

    I haven’t watched the video. I just want to say that I loved this movie up until the point where the truck didn’t explode. We’ve spent the whole movie staring at the big “FLAMMABLE” sign on the truck. Watching it explode would’ve been an immense payoff and I felt massively blueballed when it didn’t happen. Like seriously I cannot describe how irrationally upset I am about this.

    I’ve read about it and apparently Spielberg wanted a slow death for the truck. I think he could’ve had it both ways. Keep the current slow death, but at the end of it when the truck is already “dead” make some flames reach the leaking fuel and ignite the truck, exploding it. It’s even better this way because it teases you with “is it gonna explode?” and lets you worry for a second that the movie will disappoint before giving you what you want.

    Reply
  • drawkbox

    Made back in the day when vehicles were characters.

    Duel influenced tons of movies following that even up to Jeepers Creepers series, Joy Ride series, Maximum Overdrive and many more.

    I recently watched The Wraith and same thing. Lots of vehicles were characters in the 70s/80s like Back to the Future DeLorean, A-Team van, Dukes of Hazzard General Lee ([a better version for today](https://i.imgur.com/ASNmfcc.jpeg)), Knight Rider with KITT and so many more.

    Side note: The Wraith is such an 80s movie, campy, cheesy, cars, lots of 80s vibe like the burger place, the music and the clearly defined good and bad guys.

    Reply
  • thingaumbuku

    Duel is incredible, but man, the original version is leagues beyond the theatrical cut. The edits don’t ruin the movie, but what goes from a solid 10/10 becomes an 8. Still great, but they should have left well enough alone.

    Reply
  • ilovelucygal

    My mother, brothers and I were in front of the TV when this made-for-TV movie first appeared in November 1971, it was very highly rated and everyone was talking about it at school the next day. Believe it or not, there were a lot of “made-for-TV” movies in the 1970s, and ABC was known for them–and they had some excellent ones, like Duel.

    Reply
  • silverback_79

    The Lovecraftian howl of the 1955 Peterbilt truck was added by Spielberg to the shot of the blown-up Jaws-shark sinking to the bottom, just after it got smileyousonofabitched.

    Reply
  • -RickGrimes

    There’s a great Australian movie from 1981 called ‘Road Games’ that feels a lot like Duel. It would make a good double feature.

    Reply

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