Be Excellent To Each Other

A guy in a car is running away from a driverless truck in his car. At the end the truck drives off a cliff.
I think it's based on a Stephen King book - but it's not Maximum Overdrive. I think it's called something like Relentless.

What is it?

Trucks?

Duel?

Yes, it is Duel. With Dennis Weaver. Was Spielberg's first directing and writing gig as a TV movie. The network execs were so wowed by it and it did so well that they then got him to do a beefier version with extra scenes for theatrical. After that came Sugarland Express and then Jaws, and the rest was history.

Duel's awesome. Especially the bit where he's making the phone call in the snake farm.

The truck in Duel isn't driverless, though. Unless Grim... is misremembering it.

It's a good film. There's a weird sort of comforting loneliness to it, as if the guy in the car has resigned himself to the fact that he has to deal with a madman in a huge truck who wants him dead. Even the tiny pockets of civilisation he deals with feel slightly disconnected.

I think it was called The Truck That Couldn't Slow Down.

Crossroads.

Man on a ledge?

Red Bull?

Philip.

If Grim is thinking of a more modern film than Duel it's probably Road Kill.

Christine 2: With Trucks?

Was it "The Truck That Wouldn't Slow Down"?

"The Running Away From A Truck Man"?

Duel is the one. Ta!

Indeed. All that tension, etc. and you never find out why the guy's being chased.

Disappointing.

Hmm, not really.

He's not being chased for any logical reason. Like real road-rage which can start over the slightest discourtesy and get out of hand. Doesn't the truck block him from overtaking, and he gets ahead by undertaking, off the road?

Secondly, does it matter? In a horror movie you don't wonder *why* the killer is tormenting this particular bunch of teenagers, because he's a mental.

Duel is one of my favourite movies, and I only caught it quite by accident - I was just watching telly late one night and it came on, I saw the first 10 minutes and I was hooked.

And yeah, the truck isn't technically driverless as you see the guy's hand wave him on at some point, but you never see his face so for all intents and purposes it is driverless, which is part of what makes it so frightening

Isn't that why it's so terrifying? Totally motiveless, to all appearances.

Yes, but I hate endings with no satisfactory explanation. Just a personal hangup.

Did you hate Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels?

Do not watch 'Lost'!

I gave up by the first commercial break in episode 1 and have never regretted it.

Yes. Much like the events of The Birds.

And Eden Lake. Brrr.

Is Eden Lake good?

It's absolutely compelling and thrilling... but it's fucking horrible.

So: film good, what it's about not very nice.

I appreciated it, but I have no desire to watch it again.