The comments about how Two Lane Blacktop was directed and acted, and therefore how it stood out from its peers, is spot on.

But really, it wasn't a counter culture story per se. I'm not even sure if it was much of a story. What looks like a story about two guys racing another guy cross country, is actually an excuse to spend time with two cars, the '55 Bel Air mostly, and the GTO.

This move is a gearhead's movie. The way the Bel Air was set up for the street was, at the time, pretty ground breaking. It has radiused rear wheel wells and a roll cage, and a mailbox for an air scoop. It is basically a drag car set up to be street legal. It made a huge impression on gar guys back then for blending drag strip with streetability.

The GTO was "The Judge," the hottest big block GTO which Pontiac ever built. In the movie it was brand new and had only begun sales to the public within months of the movie release. Another reason to get gearheads in the seats.

My favorite part is when James Taylor asks the gas station attendant - another young guy - to fill up the tank. The guy's pumping. There's a long silence:

Gas station attendant: 350?

Taylor: 454.

Gas station attendant: No shit?

THAT is true gearhead dialogue.

Funny... where the reviewer sees a "sui generis convergence of Antonioni," you see a gearhead flick. I'm putting my money on you, my friend. The reviewer would have no idea what you're talking about, and I suspect missed the whole point of the movie. They don't teach the difference between small and big block in college film courses.

Exactly. And I suspect that's why the movie didn't do good box office back in the day. It was marketed as an art flick. It was just about cars. If only the PR talked about the Bel Air's compression ratio and cam profile.

The Mechanic to the Driver when they are being followed by the police on the streets of what I took to be Orange County:

"either lose him or foul the plugs..."

And as the Mechanic is saying this, he is rolling up the window.

Classic.

You guys know the score. No comment on the expertise.

Problem: were there not enough gearheads in America to generate box office in 1971?

I remember much of the hype of the film being tied to James Taylor, then recently on the cover of "Time" magazine as a new God of mellow folk-rock singer-songwriter music.

Problem: Taylor couldn't act. Moreover, he would rarely raise his head from below his long flow of hair (THOSE were the days) to show his face to the young ladies in the audience who wanted to see him. Dennis Wilson wasn't much better, but at least had a certain rugged presence.

The acting pro of the piece, of course, was good ol' middle-aged Warren Oates as GTO.

A lot of movies crashed in the wake of "Easy Rider." Universal would finally get a hit from its youth division from a telling source: "American Graffiti" of 1973, ABOUT good old 1962, with a hit rock title tune ("Rock Around the Clock") from 1955.

In any event, thank you for letting me piggyback on the "gearhead thread." The movie makes a lot more sense to me now, with your insights.

Contrary to the review, the biggest problem with the film was that they cut a big chunk of the gearhead scenes out of the movie.

The original screenplay had a scene where the Mechanic and the Driver are sitting on some rocks by a stream while the Girl is frolicing nude in the water and they are talking about their next car being a big block in either an Anglia or an Opel GT and whether or not to use a Chevy big block or a Mopar Hemi and how they could make the Opel a sleeper.....

It was a pretty cool scene and really said a lot about gearheads, but I suspect in the end, the editor decided that the scene would be over the audience's head and so the whole thing got cut. You can even see the gap in the film where that scene is missing.

Overall, I think the film could have had some modicum of success - not a blockbuster mind you - had it not been so over edited.

My opinion.

I saw this movie when it 1st released. I was into street racing. I enjoyed movies with interesting plots and layers of intrigue. This one had not enough of either. It wasn't heavy into racing and the girl plot was 2 dimensional and transparent. There was no draw or interest because it tried too hard and delivered nothing. Not enough motor head, not enough plot, not enough romance and so it was a zilch and it will still be a zilch.

That sounds like a great scene, Trebuchet. Yes, I bet that its editing was its undoing.

I can see the filmmaker saying, "It's about men and their machines. It's about cars."

The producer says, "People won't get it. Cut out some of the car geek stuff and get that girl more time in the picture. Let's make this about kids today and sex."

I saw this movie circa 1987 and LOVED it. The 2 cars featured became my dream cars, equal to the other. ...THIS is how "guys" communicate: long pauses, butt shifting, grimaces. I snapped up a DVD off Amazon a few years back and it remains in my "Watch" pile. ...When "Thelma & Louise" came out, I thought it a ripoff of 2-Lane. ...The burnout ending IS pretty cool, especially if you've witnessed that yourself during home movies as a kid. ...I consider it a Movie Buff "Staple". Whatever the heck subgenre it's supposed to fit within.

I was really disappointed.

I believe that Esquire still has the original screenplay on their website. Might be worth looking up.....

Extremely disappointed.

But the screenplay (when it appeared in Esquire, the movie had already been shot, so this was definitely a post production hatchet job) was truly exceptional. It is a shame they didn't let the movie be what it was intended to be.

Sorry Earlybird, but you have the dialog wrong. The gas station attendant asks if the engine is a 396, not a 350. After all, the 396 Big-Block V8 and 350 Small-Block V8s are completely different engines. And at first glance the 396 and 454 Big-Blocks can easily be mistaken for one another.

By the way, that gas station attendant is Richard Ruth who actually built the 1955 Chevrolets used in the film. And he's wearing a shirt with the logo for the Glendale Speed Center in the scene, where the cars were built.

And the scoop isn't a literal mail box, but sheetmetal riveted onto the fiberglass tilt front-end.

Otherwise, I very much agree with your analysis.

And just to prove what a grim gearhead I am, here's where I mention that the '55 Chevy driven by Harrison Ford in American Graffiti was one of the '55s from this film under black paint and wearing a set of steel wheels.

And Two Lane remains the only film in the history of Hollywood where a character goes into a parts store and buys a rebuild kit for a Quadrajet carb.

One more thing Earlybird, the '55 isn't a Bel Air. It's a 150 two-door sedan... the basesst of base models back in '55.

I love all these factoids, Pearley. Yes you ARE a true, oil in the blood gearhead!

I must be misremembering the gas station/Taylor dialogue. I don't remember them opening up the flip front clip at the gas station, which would have given the attendant the opportunity to see the size of the block.

The 454 must have been just recently introduced around the release of that movie, right? (Forgive me, I'm most a Blue Oval guy.)

I should have mentioned that hood also in my first post.