Steel Notes Magazine www . steelnotesmagazine . com
Steel Notes Magazine
Menace to Society
Film Review : Menace to Society by Jerry Saravia
December 2016
Right at the start of Steven Spielberg ' s masterfully exciting " Duel ," you can see the unimaginable road trip the main character has to face . The unaired theatrical version of this TV-movie shows Dennis Weaver ' s Red Plymouth Valiant pulling out of a suburban garage from his intrinsic pointof-view ( Suburbia has been an iconic staple of Spielberg ’ s work ). Through a series of dissolves , Weaver ’ s character travels through the city streets and tunnels until he is finally in the lonely desert road . He is David Mann , a salesman presumably headed to some city or town for a meeting . We never know what David sells nor do we need to . When he tries to pass a gas tanker truck in a Californian two-lane road stretch , the truck roars past David like a bat out of hell . It startles David and before long , the chase is on . This is not so much a cat-and-mouse chase – it is a terrifying chase picture where the truck driver ’ s intent is to kill David .
The only instance where the film rests is literally at rest stops . A truck stop café is the setting for various truck drivers who look on at David as David sitting at a table , imagining which one is the menace on the highway . David can ’ t figure it out and , alarmingly , as he picks a fight with one truck driver who has similar-looking boots , the ominous gas tanker truck through the window ’ s
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