The Car (1977)

Despite the fact that it is a hugely derivative film, there is something about The Car (1977) that lingers in the memory.  Obviously inspired by the enigmatic, homicidal truck of Duel (1971) and the shark of Jaws (1976), (both directed by Steven Spielberg), relentlessly stalking the seas for prey, The Car tries to transplant the same basic scenario to the sort of small and remote desert town setting beloved of fifties science fiction B-movies.  Unfortunately, director Elliot Silverstein isn't as adept as Spielberg when it comes to building up and maintaining the suspense and tension.  He isn't helped by a script that never really feels as if it knows where it is heading, spending far too much time on sub-plots involving the town's residents and not enough on properly defining and developing the titular threat, an apparently driverless car that keeps targeting other road users.  Clunky dialogue and some correspondingly clunky performances from the cast don't help, either.  But it is the car itself which remains the film's most problematic element.  The script can seemingly never really make up its mind as to its nature.  Now, there's nothing wrong in refusing to give definitive explanation of a cinematic threat of this nature - Hitchcock's The Birds (1963), for instance, steadfastly refuses to explain why the eponymous creatures suddenly turn against man, with the continued enigma enhancing the threat that they represent.  Similarly, Duel never explains the motivations of the truck's mostly unseen driver, but this never lessens the menace of the truck or the tension that its appearances generate.  But The Car tries to have its cake and eat it, floating and hinting at all manner of explanations for the title menace, but never settling on any one, until the ending half heartedly giving a vague demonic apparition in the explosion accompanying its apparent demise.

This inability to define the threat (in Duel, we know that the truck has a driver - we see his arm at the window - but this doesn't lessen the threat or undermine the audience's identification of it as a rampaging force of evil, likewise the shark in Jaws is clearly flesh and blood, but this doesn't lessen its menace), means that the car itself is highly inconsistent as a threat throughout the movie.  At times it seems to be a supernatural threat - its inability to enter consecrated ground, for instance and its ability to seemingly disappear into thin air - while at others it seems a very real and solid threat, which obeys the laws of physics and mechanics - its attacks on pedestrians and its appearance in the protagonist's garage, for example.  It is at its most intriguing and menacing when it appears to act as a living being in its own right - reacting violently to being insulted or rebuked, stalking its victims, taunting the protagonist by cracking open its driver's door, but not enough to see who or what is inside.  Which is where the car also becomes the film's biggest strength.  Not only does it have a terrific physical presence thanks to George Barris' customisation of a Lincoln Mk III, its grill and lights combining with its lowered stance to give the impression of a glowering, crouched predator, but some of its appearances are filmed in a such a way as to be suspenseful and menacing.  Particularly effective are the in car, point of view, shots as it stalks victims (most notably the two cyclists at the beginning), taken through its tinted windscreen (the yellowish colour of the tint hinting at a sulphurous atmosphere).  Unfortunately, these also confuse the viewer as to the nature of the car, implying the presence of someone behind the wheel, observing the victims.

The car also has one particularly spectacular and memorable kill, when it crashes through a house in order to get at a victim.  This is also one of the best shot scenes in the film, with the victim on the phone, framed in front of a window, through which the audience can see its lights appear and approach the unsuspecting victim.  Moreover, the scene is doubly jolting as, without warning, it abruptly kills off a key sympathetic character.  If the film had had more scenes of this kind and had been equally as ruthless with regard to other characters, then The Car might well have been a far more effective horror film.  As it is, it is far too long, badly needing to pare down those talky scenes in the town and focus more on the car itself and its murderous antics.  Perhaps the most surprising thing about the film is its failure to develop its central idea as any kind of analogy for the rise of the American obsession with the automobile and/or its detrimental effects of society and the environment.  Such things wouldn't necessarily have had to be rammed down the audience's throat, some subtle irony or satire would have been as effective, but The Car steadfastly ignores these potential themes altogether, leaving it as a an entirely superficial cinematic experience.  Nonetheless, the car itself remains memorable, having far more screen presence than any of the human cast, its appearances creating a genuine sense of unease and the film's basic idea has considerable potential that is never realised.  Ultimately, the car is a great movie monster, deserving a far better cinematic vehicle than The Car.