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The Car

The Car

Horror · Action · Thriller · 1977

The Utah community of Santa Ynez is being terrorized by a mysterious black coupe that appears out of nowhere and begins running people down. After the car kills off the town sheriff, Captain Wade Parent is determined to stop the murderous driver.

Movie details

The Car

“Is it a phantom, a demon, or the devil himself?”

1977 Horror · Action · Thriller 1h 36m

Critical arithmetic

The consensus, allegedly.

IMDb

6.2 / 10

12.9K votes

Rotten Tomatoes

32 %

Tomatometer

Metacritic

21 / 100

Metascore

TMDB

6.4 / 10

Community rating

External scores via OMDb · CC BY-NC 4.0. Values normalized for display; availability varies by title.

The Utah community of Santa Ynez is being terrorized by a mysterious black coupe that appears out of nowhere and begins running people down. After the car kills off the town sheriff, Captain Wade Parent is determined to stop the murderous driver.

CriticWise case file

What this film says about your taste.

Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.

The archetype split

Who fights over The Car?

The split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.

Taste neighbourhood

Nearby on the taste map.

TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.

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Where it lives

Watch in your region.

Cinema release signals and current streaming, rental, and purchase options for your region.

Streaming availability data supplied by JustWatch.

Names above the title

The people responsible.

Directed by

Elliot Silverstein

Written by

Michael Butler · Dennis Shryack · Lane Slate

James Brolin

James Brolin

Wade Parent

Kathleen Lloyd

Kathleen Lloyd

Lauren Humphries

John Marley

John Marley

Everett

R.G. Armstrong

R.G. Armstrong

Amos Clements

John Rubinstein

John Rubinstein

John Norris

E

Elizabeth Thompson

Margie Johnson

Roy Jenson

Roy Jenson

Ray Mott

Court is in session

Put The Car on trial.

Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.

The defence The Adrenaline Seeker

“Its refusal to behave is the point.”

The strange choices create the kind of friction that follows you out of the theatre and into the argument.

The prosecution The Prestige Tourist

“Oddness is not depth.”

A film can break every rule and still leave nothing behind but the memory of how hard it tried to be singular.