Steven Spielberg and Duel: The Making of a Film Career
Like The Sugarland Express, Steven Spielberg’s first theatrical film, Duel (1971) is a Spielberg movie a lot of people have heard about but never seen. It was a TV movie, with a screenplay by Richard Matheson (who wrote the short story on which the film was based), starring Dennis Weaver as an unassuming traveler harassed by the faceless driver of a big rig. Doesn’t sound like much, but in Spielberg’s hands, as film historian Awalt notes in this very engaging and perceptive “making of” book, the film delivers fear and nail-biting tension. This is really two making-of books in one: the story of the production of Duel, and the story of Spielberg himself, the kid who dreamed of making movies, who was directing episodic television when he was barely old enough to drink and who leveraged a brilliant TV movie into a brilliant film career. This well-presented look at a legendary directors beginning contains, as an added bonus, the complete Duel screenplay, itself a small masterpiece. --David Pitt