Films/DVD Asylum

Posted by roger l on September 12, 2003 at 14:57:25

The excellent movie "Breakdown"IMO (1997) with Kurt Russell and Kathleen Quinlan, JD Walsh etc seems like it takes after a 1971 film (S Spielberg?) "Duel" with Dennis Weaver.

Though you never see the villain(s) in "Duel" and the themes are different (Breakdown is about a vacation with the wife, Duel is about a business man travelling on his own) there are several similarities such as being chased at high speed by a truck, the truck's nose becoming quite prominent several times, going into a coffee shop with several townspeople, going into the bathroom, and the villain being pushed off a cliff in the truck by the victim accelerating the car without a driver in it so it ends up pushing the truck off a cliff.

Was breakdown therefore patterned after Duel? Does anyone know anything?