Hot Toddie Schoonover is celebrating the 5th Annual Hasselhoff Avatar week February 1-7

Watch the movies from Bravo's 100 Scariest Movie Momments (read all 41 entries…)
#67 Duel 3 years ago

Watching the DVD I realize I’ve seen this 1971 movie before. We watched it on video tape in gifted class when we were learning about social commentary and first person narratives. I also remember the “stock footage” from this film being in an episode of “The Incredible Hulk”.

In today’s era of rampant road rage, Spielberg’s film seems more likely to happen now than it did in 1971. The scares here come from situations including the potential to be pushed into a train or will the truck take out the school bus of kids? While well-done, you’re left wondering what the motivation of the never seen trucker is. It’s supposedly based on a true story of a trucker who wanted to get one vehicle from every state.

4 out of 5 stars

Nov 18, 2006, 07:51AM PST | 12 cheers


Comments:

bananapancakes

Duel is one of my favorite movies! I didn’t know it was based on a true story. I remember watching it as a kid and it freaked me out. Whenever I catch it on TV, I still try to see the truck driver’s face (even though I know it won’t be shown)...

Nov 18, 2006, 08:20AM PST | Thread | Respond to this 4 cheers

Hot Toddie Schoonover is celebrating the 5th Annual Hasselhoff Avatar week February 1-7

Real Story

I’d written that based on trivia that was included on IMDB. I watched the writer’s commentary on the DVD and discovered that he had lived through an episode where a truck was following them and they wound up driving off the road up an embankment to avoid it. So that gave him the premise to do the story which first ran through Playboy magazine.

Nov 18, 2006, 07:23PM PST | Respond to this 3 cheers

SallyKitt "Action is the antidote to despair" - Joan Baez

This is a classic!

Did you watch the making of stuff? Very interesting.

I drive Sierra Highway on my way home from work many days—when avoiding the 14 freeway, which wasn’t finished when Spielberg filmed, even though there’s a big sign at the beginning of the movie.

The diner is now a fine French restaurant, still pretty much in the middle of nowhere. They’ve added onto it a big, and I’ve eaten there once.

It’s funny when you know the road to watch this and realize that although they were supposed to be heading in one general direction all the time, the shots in one sequence are sometimes going back and forth.

SPOILER::::

Another cool thing: the groaning sound when the truck goes over the cliff was also used as the base of the sound when the shark is sinking in Jaws.

Nov 18, 2006, 08:33AM PST | Thread | Respond to this

Hot Toddie Schoonover is celebrating the 5th Annual Hasselhoff Avatar week February 1-7

Making Of...

Being a film buff, I enjoy those kinds of extras on DVDs. I did watch them. I found it interesting to learn how Spielberg didn’t want to do tv work, but had to if he was going to get the recognition he needed to be used on films. I also picked up on that back and forth driving in the making of. Spielberg said that he’d done that to save on having to reset the cameras and just filmed the vehicles with them going in both directions since the view along the side of the road would be different. It was also neat to learn some of the tricks of making the vehicles seem to be going very fast when they were only going 25 MPH in some scenes.

Nov 18, 2006, 07:20PM PST | Thread | Respond to this 5 cheers

SallyKitt "Action is the antidote to despair" - Joan Baez

Making of...

That was one of the better making of extras, wasn’t it? Some of the making of segments end up just being one cast member going around the set one day getting people to be cute, or mini-interviews with the stars in their costumes sitting in directors chairs!

Nov 19, 2006, 05:54AM PST | Thread | Respond to this

Hot Toddie Schoonover is celebrating the 5th Annual Hasselhoff Avatar week February 1-7

It Was

Actually all three of them were, but then I think the first two were directed by Spielberg so that had something to do with it. I liked how they included footage not only of this film but of other films that were referenced (like the Jaws scene). These were well produced documentaries instead of just a typical interview with the stars or let’s give someone a handicam for the day bit.

Nov 19, 2006, 08:15AM PST | Respond to this 1 cheer

Ellie

You've got me wondering...

if I’ve seen this film now. I remember seeing some scary truck film lol. ::Goes off to find out more about it::

Nov 21, 2006, 09:08AM PST | Thread | Respond to this 1 cheer

Hot Toddie Schoonover is celebrating the 5th Annual Hasselhoff Avatar week February 1-7

Scary Trucks

So did you see “Duel” or was it “Maximum Overdrive” that you refer to as the scary truck movie?

Nov 22, 2006, 10:38PM PST | Thread | Respond to this 2 cheers

Ellie

I'm pretty sure...

it was Duel. It must of been years and years ago though, so I think I’ll watch it again before marking it off.

Nov 23, 2006, 07:02AM PST | Respond to this 2 cheers


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