Year of Release: 1971Country of Origin: USA
Director: Steven Spielberg
Cast: Dennis Weaver, Eddie Firestone, Gene Dynarski, Tim Herbert
Plot outline: A business commuter is pursued and terrorized by a malevolent driver of a massive tractor-trailer (IMDb).
Steven Spielberg first made his mark with a television movie about a diabolical truck, a subject that would seem to have only limited possibilities. In fact, Duel took advantage of the very narrowness of its premise, building excitement from the most minimal ingredients and the simplest of situations. Even without benefit of hindsight, Duel looks like the work of an unusually talented young director. Duel begins when a California businessman embarks on a car trip and happens to pass a certain truck on a two-lane road. The truck, which seems to have a mind of its own (the driver is never clearly seen), wants revenge and spends the rest of the journey getting it. The trip, which is a succession of nerve-wracking chases (truck gets behind car and forces it to speed up; truck gets in front of car and tries to force it off the road; truck butts car into path of oncoming train, etc.), was indeed a long one. According to the production notes, Dennis Weaver, who plays the car's driver David Mann, put in more than 2,000 miles during the 16-day shooting schedule. Duel might almost have been a silent movie, because it expresses so much through action and so little through the words. As the movie's only real character, Weaver gives a few internal monologues that only awkwardly express Mann's anxiety. These and a few whimsical conversations from a call-in radio show are really all the character development the movie provides, and they're much weaker than the ingenious visual effects. Spielberg wasn't purely a special-effects director in those days, and he isn't one now, but the people in Duel seem particularly remote. The minor characters, at the various stops Mann makes along the highway, are uniformly freakish. And Mann himself is shown to be a henpecked husband who regains his masculinity only through the contest on the road. The ending is abrupt, but the main impression left is one of talent and energy. Spielberg seemed, with this movie, to be headed for bigger and better things. Sure enough, he was! (NYT)
My judgement: ***1/2 out of 4 stars
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