Trailer
Plot summary
Arthur Waldo and his older brother George drive their caravan through the countryside until an accident on the road into Paris, a small town whose livelihood comes from the wrecks it causes. George is killed and Arthur is spared. Mayor Len Kelly takes the visitor into his home, where two girls have been adopted after losing parents in similar crashes. Arthur wants to leave, but no public transport serves Paris and he has lost his nerve at the wheel since being cleared of manslaughter for running over a pedestrian. The mayor makes him a hospital orderly. Younger men in town rebuild the ruined cars into strange machines and use them to terrorize the older residents.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Cars That Ate Paris (1974)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- After the film's success at Cannes, its producers failed to negotiate an American release with Roger Corman; Corman then hired Paul Bartel to direct Death Race 2000, and Bartel knew Corman owned a print of The Cars That Ate Paris.
- Peter Weir got the idea for The Cars That Ate Paris while driving through Europe, when road signs on French main roads sent him into villages he found strangely little.
- The Cars That Ate Paris originally started as a comedy built to star Grahame Bond, but the project later evolved into something else.
- The Cars That Ate Paris was Peter Weir's first feature film, and its story was an original one that he had written himself.
