The Cars That Ate Paris

I'm just not sure what ultimate point co-writer/director Peter Weir was trying to make with his debut picture, 1974's THE CARS THAT ATE PARIS.  It's a truly odd flick, classified mainly as horror but it is certainly also a social drama spiced with very black humor and satire.  Only a smattering of it worked for me.  It just felt so confused.  Maybe the metaphors were lost.  Maybe I needed to be more familiar with Australian culture to really get it.

Paris is a tiny backwater of under two hundred residents.  They are running a grisly scheme in which passing motorists are set up for accidents off a mountain road just outside of town. Why? Are the residents selling those expensive hood ornaments off the Jags? Merely raiding the victims' wallets? Does that subsidize the local economy? It seems that the salvaged parts actually end up on the rather odd vehicles of the town's ruffian youths.  Most of the accident victims perish.  The ones who survive are brought to the hospital and lobotomized with a power drill that sports a Red Cross decal.  The "veggies" become subjects for experimentation by the local surgeon. Is he trying to publish something revolutionary?  Everyone in town is on the sinister secret.

After Arthur (Terry Camilleri) survives a crash (his brother is not so fortunate), he is allowed to live among the locals, even being more or less adopted by the Mayor (John Meillon).  Another big "why", and the film never really answers this.   But the rather ineffectual young man knows something is wrong before he finds out just what, and wants to leave.  Because of a previous auto mishap which left an old man dead, Arthur finds he no long feels confident behind the wheel.

About halfway through THE CARS THAT ATE PARIS, another theme begins to emerge: youth versus the old guard, leading to a brutal, chaotic finale.  That thread in itself was interesting, but it proved to be as dissatisfying as all the others.  It's a bit maddening as it is obvious Weir is intending to make some trenchant, devastating (political?) points, but they just don't land.  The opening scene is an amusing parody of '70s commercials, and consumerism is certainly a target throughout the movie, but also underdeveloped.

So that leaves the horror/thriller elements.  Fairly effective there, with some surprisingly graphic shots of accident victims.  Weir creates some texture and local color, which in turn provides an uneasy (and just about thoroughly unpleasant) atmosphere.  The film may well be most distinguished by that caravan of souped up freak cars, the most famous of which is a VW bug affixed from bumper to bumper with long spikes, seen on many of the film's posters..