User reviews

Before Peter Weir got really famous, he made this strange but worth seeing flick about a small town in Australia whose local economy centers on car wrecks, and how they draw an outsider in. "The Cars That Ate Paris" doesn't star anyone whom you would recognize, and there's no big action scenes here, but that actually gives the movie a more realistic feeling.

I should identify that this is not a movie for those with short attention spans. It's not likely to stick heavily in your memory the way that most of Peter Weir's movies do (it's certainly not my favorite of his movies). But still, it's something to check out as a historical reference if nothing else.

"I can drive!" You'll probably feel like you can too.

This little film appears to have stirred up radical dissent amongst many reviewers. Comments ranging from "stupid," "dull," "dark," "gothic," even "evil!" (I liked that one particularly!) Some other moron figured it was the worst film he'd ever seen. (Obviously he didn't sit through I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE!)

Now time-out here...let's just back it up a bit! Peter Weir is not what you would term a prolific director. He has made just 15 features in exactly 30 years - he doesn't rush things! This was his second turn in the chair. He had at his disposal a budget not much more than that for a 60 second TV Commercial and he was under pressure to finish the flick in time for its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival that year. He did OK and in a master stroke of marketing, managed to get the "star" of the movie - the spiked beetle, on to the Cannes streets where it caused a media sensation. The film was very well received by an appreciative audience.

So, the story is far-fetched? Some of the residents of tiny bush-town Paris deliberately cause auto-wrecks to boost the town's economy. Sure its a way left-field storyline and the acting was never going to win an Oscar nomination. It has though, that indefinable "something" and is early Peter Weir - a study of people in crisis or near crisis? It deserves to be seen for what it is, and the manner in which it shaped Peter Weir's future. THE CARS THAT ATE PARIS was in effect a springboard that gave Weir the opportunity to make PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK the following year. If "Paris" had been a total flop he may never have been asked to direct it!

Watch it again and look for innovation, clever camera angles, smart direction...they're all there! This is relegated now to almost cult film-status in Australia, it is somewhat of a time-capsule!

The only question I have, is who changed the name of this film to THE CARS THAT ATE PEOPLE for US release? especially as they have their OWN "Paris"...in Texas!

Peter Weir must have been an angry young man as his first film makes fun of every level of society. The corrupt, bumptious, mayor of the two-bit New South Wales town is the obvious fall guy, but no single character escapes Weir's wrath. You might expect the wild, local youths with their vitality to provide the film's conscience, but they are ultimately portrayed as dumb, reactionary yokels whose demise is mocked. Tellingly the film's key line, 'I can drive', is used to belittle the death of the gang member we get to know best. However, Weir goes too far by mocking the audience. Our hero is a pathetic emotional wreck who barely speaks, while many scenes are dragged out with ponderous monologues and plodding development, as if Weir is saying 'you've consumed this sort of rubbish before, now I am going to serve it up to you in a dark satire. Can you tell the difference?'. The Cars That Ate Paris is best watched with the fast forward in your hand, but do not skip the brilliant finale in which the sordid little town gets its just desserts.

Before Peter Weir went on to make 'A' class films such as The Dead Poets Society and Witness, he had a rather unsuccessful stint as a B-movie cult flick director. Despite the fact that he's become better known for his critically acclaimed films, his lesser cult films show much more imagination and are far more fun to watch. The Cars That Ate Paris works from a delicious premise. A small township in Australia named 'Paris' causes car accidents and salvages valuables from the wreckages. The town's currency is radios, clothes etc and this lucrative business is doing well for the town. When someone survives a crash, they usually end up mentally disabled, which is good for the town as it stops them from being caught by the pesky insurance investigator. This is all well and good until George and brother Arthur drive into town. George is killed in the crash, but Arthur survives it; pretty much unharmed. Nobody has ever left Paris before, which prompts the Mayor to take the young man into his family home. This is something that will go on to have massive repercussions on the township of Paris...

Peter Weir deliciously blends several elements into the plot line. On one hand, we have the incredibly surreal idea of a whole town killing people for their valuables. This blends with the whole crazy cult idea, and this in turn mixes with the idea of the things that people will do to survive. Weir has speckled the movie with loads of great imagery, such as the old women who's job it is to take the valuables from the cars stuffing clothes down their top, and the devilish cornerstone of society, the Mayor, overseeing all the horror. Despite all the film's good elements, however, Weir has failed to make the film a complete whole. It may be down to inexperience, but while he's busy creating his atmosphere; the characters have been forgotten about, and this makes it difficult to care for them, and the story beyond an aesthetic level. There is much to like about this movie, and it's definitely worth seeing for the imagery alone; but it's hard to really love it, and that stops me from giving the film a high rating. I still recommend the movie, however, as it's well worth seeing.

I loved how Peter Weir used such restraint in helping us understand what was going on in this remote town, much of the time without using dialogue. It's a great premise and it sets itself up for drama in several different ways - the man who finds himself trapped in a town that's deliberately causing fatal accidents and harvesting cars, the survivors of these accidents cruelly turned into "veggies" by drilling into their brains, and the outlaw group of younger men who recklessly drive tricked out cars to terrorize members of the status quo. Those old cars, one adorned with spikes like an armored porcupine and others with scowling faces painted on them, were pretty cool.

Unfortunately the film didn't do enough in any of these areas, instead rather listlessly following the trapped man around during a middle section which felt overly long. To put it simply, there wasn't enough escalation in the subplots. There also weren't flashbacks to provide context, very little character development, and no capitalizing on the gruesome operations on the "veggies," or even explaining why they wouldn't just be killed. By the time the finale rolled along, it just felt like the film had been drifting along, not knowing where to go, and needed some violence and car crashes. Maybe a remake could keep the organic feel but inject more life into the script.

A man and his brother are involved in an accident deliberately caused by the residents of a hellish little town, Paris, New South Wales. The surviving brother doesn't realize that the accident was deliberate and oddly the town's weirdo residents decide to keep him and make him a part of their community. I have no idea why they didn't just kill him. Regardless, during his stay he begins to see how bizarre this town is, with young people driving around like extras from the Mad Max movies and a lot of mindless violence late in the film--violence that really looked as if the filmmakers didn't quite know what to do with the story.

When "The Cars That Ate Paris" debuted, a lot of folks were upset because they found the film so bloody and gross. Well, today you certainly wouldn't think that, as times have certainly changed. Instead, you might be more likely to have folks react as I did-- with a surprising amount of boredom. While the idea is pretty radical and sounds exciting, it somehow isn't due to very slow pacing and a story that fails to capitalize on the great idea. Watch it if you'd like...just don't be too surprised when you find the whole thing a bit ponderous. The only thing I really liked in this film was the spiky VW. Where can I get one of those?!

This is an Aussie black comedy from the 70's and its also one of Peter Weirs first films. The film is a classic because it cambium's humor ,action & horror all in the same film. John Meillon's performance alone makes this film worth watching.A nutty mayor who is willing to do anything to keep people in the town and that includes killing them! the film is also worth watching for the performances of Bruce Spence & Chris Haywood because these actors are still working ! Its not the greatest film but it a film that will make you watch from start to finish because you never know what will happen next! Terry Camilleri's performance is very good for his first acting experience!

after hearing about this film since the 80s, i finally got the chance to see it and was seriously disappointed. it's only slightly unusual and not at all funny. i was under the impression that mysterious possessed cars attack a town in a campy hysterical "attack of the killer tomatos" style.

the cars are just human driven customs and very little actually happens in the film. there's one or two chuckles, but there are many more wierder and/or funnier b-movies out there more deserving of a "rep" than this one.

it's like a watered down "present day" version of "the road warrior" without any of that film's charm. it may have been the influence for it though as the "helicopter jockey" plays a small part in this film.

worth seeing if you have to see every cult film ever made, but not if you need to stay awake.

4 out of 10 overrated as a classic b-movie.

First, let me note that there seems to be different versions of the film floating around on home video. A few reviews complain about poorly lit or dark scenes. Someone mentioned that there's a bad pan & scan version floating around. And apparently, in the early history of the film, there was a badly cut version making the rounds with the title Cars That Eat People. That may have even ended up on VHS. So make sure you get the Home Vision Entertainment DVD released in 2003. It also has director Peter Weir's film The Plumber (1979) as a bonus, plus interviews with Weir about each film, as well as trailers. More importantly, it has a pristine, original widescreen cut of The Cars That Ate Paris. As long as you have your television or monitor set up correctly, the film has remarkably crisp, frequently beautiful cinematography that looks like it could have been shot yesterday.

There also seems to be a lot of misunderstanding about the nature of the film. Basically, The Cars That Ate Paris is a quirky art-house drama. Yes, it has elements of (macabre) humor, horror and many other genres, but those are not a focus. The Cars That Ate Paris is as much a western as it is a horror film, which is not to say that it doesn't have elements of the western genre--it does. But the tone is much more similar to, say, Bagdad Café (aka Out of Rosenheim, 1987) or Delicatessen (1991) (hmmm--notice the culinary metaphor motif). If you want to think of The Cars That Ate Paris as a horror film--and it is basically a surrealist nightmare--think of it as something like Maximum Overdrive (1986)/Trucks ((1997) meets Horror Hotel (aka City of the Dead, 1960), but made by David Lynch as a "realist" soap opera.

So what is the film about more literally? Well, it's best perhaps if you know as little about it before as possible, but on the other hand, it's a bit cryptic, and Peter Weir isn't exactly forthcoming with explanatory exposition--the film remains very open to interpretation to the end--so maybe a vague description won't hurt. The Paris of the title is not in France. It's instead a small, bucolic village in rural Australia. The town has quite a few "dirty secrets". The two primary secrets have to do with an automobile (part) obsession and a program of human experimentation. For the most part, they try to keep people out of the town, which has a very small population, but their twisted fetishes necessitate the occasional admission of outsiders, though in an unusual, involuntary manner. The film is centered on the story of one particular outsider, Arthur Waldo (Terry Camilleri), who manages to enter Paris relatively unscathed and who for unspecified reasons is worked into the fabric of the town. Arthur's arrival and integration roughly corresponds to a growing cleavage between generations, or at least between the status quo and a rebellious group of younger men, and he unwittingly serves as a catalyst to what amounts to a civil war.

Although in Peter Weir's video interview included on the DVD he refers to Arthur as an unsympathetic protagonist, I beg to differ. Camilleri plays Arthur as an enigmatically captivating simpleton--the most entrancing "blank" personality this side of Peter Sellers' Chauncey Gardiner in Being There (1979). For most of the film, Weir shuttles Arthur around like a pawn, enabling a metaphorical window through which to satirically examine small town (Australian) life. In this respect, The Cars That Ate Paris somewhat resembles the basic gist of Lars von Trier's Dogville (2003), except that unlike Dogville, The Cars That Ate Paris is a good film.

It's particularly funny how Arthur is shuttled into a variety of jobs, which he is assumed qualified for by a mere change of clothing (and very minor changes at that) and title. He's a doctor one moment, a parking enforcer the next. Weir works in satirical jabs towards everything from appealing to noble grand narratives about pioneer forefathers to the discrepancy between religious, private and political life, the myth of the well-adjusted nuclear family, the charade of public ceremonies, and even partakes in a slight Lord of the Flies-styled commentary on "progress".

But not everything is social critique. Weir is just as concerned with (and just as good at) imbibing in quirkiness for its own sake (although even that stuff we could read as a critique on social conventions if we wanted to) and see-sawing between a kind of community existentialist nightmare and an Our Town-like small village drama. And just in case that's too balanced, every so often he puts us in the middle of a spaghetti western, with the beginnings of mid-street showdowns. Much of the rebellious youth material can be interpreted as a western with hodge-podge automobiles, which is probably why those youths are the ones to don clothing that looks as if Weir borrowed it from the set of A Fistful of Dollars (aka Per un pugno di dollari, 1964).

The music is similarly disparate, ranging from techno-psychedelia that's something like Pink Floyd's "Time" to pensive contemporary-sounding themes, or the hilariously amateurish performance at the Paris Ball.

This is definitely not a film for all tastes. If you wouldn't typically like art-house films, you probably won't appreciate The Cars That Ate Paris, either, and even if you do typically like art-house films, you probably won't appreciate The Cars That Ate Paris unless you have a strong taste for the bizarre and macabre.

Peter Weir is a legend of film making. Partly because he can create movies that have good solid plots yet is able to transcend those plots to give us something else.

So you want to see where he started see "The cars that ate Paris." I saw this on TV from a very bad print, I hope a better version has since been released.

In outback Australia there is a small town whose financial crisis has meant they have resorted to causing car accidents, salvaging the cars and selling the parts to make some money.

When one of the victims survives an accident and they decide to keep him we are given a witness into the fall of Paris as it destroys itself over the car.

A cult movie that has been turned into theatre in I believe the town of Lismore in Austrlia, it is haunting, quirky and perhaps a movie of its time and location.

But you see for Peter Weir the story is told not with characters, plot and dialogue, rather it is in the total flow of the movie. Here in his first movie the flow is at the forefront, in later movies it achieves a balance with the plot, finally taking second place in his later works.

The cars that do the eating (in a metaphorical manner) include a VW beetle covered in spikes. This is a favourite of fans, but personally I think it sucks.

What I really want to know is what Max Gillies (a comedian known to many Australians) is doing waggling his trademark eyebrows in this movie.

There is one reason to see this movie, it is you may hate it or you may love it. That is justification enough to take the risk and see it.

One hour into this movie and I wasn't exactly sure what kind of movie it was trying to "be". It starts off as a smalltown horror mystery of sorts but Peter Weir saddles it with so much absurdist black comedy the mystery all but evaporates and we're looking at something that is more weird/awkward than mysterious/surreal, more slow-ponderous than slow-absorbing, large parts of it reminiscent of Aki Kaurismaki and his static shots, cynical humor, deadpan delivery, and smalltown squalor. By the end of it however, the movie seems to emerge as some sort of societal parable, an allegory to the repression of a close-knit society that values appearances and tradition more than anything else and which must bury secrets in its own backyard to do so, but there's so much distraction and incoherence the point is never made with any clarity or force.

At one point the score turns Morricone circa Once Upon a Time in the West and we get a showdown in the street and young men dressed with cowboy hats. We get Carmageddon-style cars circling the statue of a cannon like Comanches painted for war. We get the vague promise of a subplot about car crash survivors turned vegetables who are kept in the hospital of the small town and who later turn up in a ball masque dressed in hoods and carton boxes (a nod to Shock Corridor?), but it never goes anywhere. Peter Weir went on to make such remarkable films as Picnic at Hanging Rock and The Last Wave, and while this never reaches the hypnotic levels of those films, it's intriguing in its own quirky awkward way. It's like a movie struggling with itself, a cult classic trying to break free from the confines of a forgettable eccentricity.

The people of a small Australian village deliberately cause car accidents for out-of-towners passing through so they can profit from looting. One victim survives and the community tries to make him a member, but he unintentionally rekindles what appears to be a feud between the elders and the car-loving youths. Whoa. Huh? What? Right. The Netflix envelope said this was a satire about how much Australians are obsessed with cars (?) and a review I read implied that this film is a metaphor for New Nationalism in the 70s (??) All of that flew over my head. Still I can't say I didn't like Peter Weir's first film, and it works as a decent slow-burn horror. Also, some of the designs on the rebel youth cars were damn nifty.

I really wish that the cars had hurried up and eaten Paris like 10 minutes in, so I wouldn't have to sit through this boring waste of time. The poor lighting and budget really show here and make this movie painful to watch. This movie is so devoid of any action and is so frustratingly paced that I barely made it through without fast forwarding. In fact I showed this movie to a friend with major parts fast forwarded and he didn't miss any of the plot. Watching this movie in fast forward (my 2nd viewing) shows just how many scenes were totally worthless and just add to the boredom. I have seen other Weir movies before, and understand that his pacing is really slow and doesn't follow conventional plots, but this movie was very unappealing. Picnic At Hanging Rock is a vastly superior Weir film if you are at all interested in the director. That movie creates an interesting mode and the mysterious circumstances are inticing, here there is no inticement. This movie is recommended only to those who are either Austrailian and have an interest in some black humor (which is greatly lost on anyone who isn't austrialian) or those who like to watch MST3k quality movies, minus the commentary.

Zoopansick

That's Paris, Australia. The locals in the small community have set up the road where unwitting drivers are tricked into accidents. The cars are stripped and belongings stolen. Any survivors are taken to a hospital where they are experimented upon. The young kids use the wrecks to build wild cars in demolition stunts.

Australian Peter Weir is the director and writer. It doesn't have the action to compete against other compatriot B-movies especially when Australia is starting to be known for pushing the horror envelope. A sharp eye will notice a couple of recognizable Australian faces. This is a horror of ideas. I would use them differently. I would use the crazy cars in some sort of competition. That would inject this with plenty of car stunt action. I guess that they saved most of it for the last act. I would cut out the hospital and just kill all the victims. That would alleviate any questions from outsiders. For this provocative title, this movie needs wall-to-wall car action and it way late when the freaky cars show up. This does have some interesting horror ideas.

This movie was recommeded to me by a friend, who, by the way, is no longer a reliable source for movie recommendations. I was expecting to see cars, Awesome cars with huge motors tearing up the lamest place on the planet "Paris" with extreme prejudice. I ended up sitting through a snore fest, and I can't even tell you what it was about because my attention span stops after 5 minutes when there isn't a violent murder. I was expecting something like Death Race 2000 meeets the Roadwarrior and got Mister Rogers in rehabilitation, Do not watch this movie, there was a VW bug with rubber spikes on it, thats all I remember, and it did nothing. They didn't even drop a thermo-nuclear bomb on the eiffel tower, what a horrible film.

Of course the cars don't literally 'eat' Paris... This film was a good indication of what Peter Weir was capable of over twenty years before he made 'The Truman Show.' This is a strange movie, set in a weird town in a barren outback landscape where the normal rules of western society are being quietly ignored by the citizens for their own ends. There are peculiar parallels with 'Mad Max,' and I wonder if Australians are somehow daunted by the vastness of their own country, what it might conceal and their reliance on the automobile. 'The Cars That Ate Paris' is a gothic horror which takes a glancing swipe at consumerism and how it disassociates small communities. This is flagged right at the beginning with the opening parody of a cigarette commercial (also killers!) ending in the first wreck. There are lashings of black humour like this and a few things to say about religion and the cult of the car. A fine low-budget film.

The small town of Paris, Australia deliberately causes car accidents, then sells/salvages all valuables from the wrecks as a means of economy.

Peter Weir got the idea to make the film while driving through Europe where road signs on the main French roads diverted him into what he perceived as strange little villages. It originally started as a comedy to star Grahame Bond but later evolved. The idea of a small village thriving on an unusual and macabre economy is interesting, though I found it rather lacking in the horror category. The horror label misled me, I think.

The producers unsuccessfully attempted to negotiate an American release for the film with Roger Corman after it was shown with great success at the Cannes Film Festival. What is most interesting about this is the suggestion that the film was somehow an influence on Corman's "Death Race 2000" (1975), which would have gone into production at about the time Corman saw "Cars". But it is a bit of a stretch, since "Death Race" came from a short story and was Corman's response to "Rollerball"... any Weir connection would be minor.

I wasn't surprised to read that distributors didn't know whether to market "The Cars that Ate Paris" as a horror movie or an art movie. I don't really know what to make of it. Its fundamentally disturbing premise - a town in which the residents engineer car "accidents" and scavenge the remains - is handled so sedately it barely even registers. There is also a more serious social issue that the movie deals with about the battle between the young and the old. Any Australian is familiar with the term "hoon" and knows that these are usually young men. The movie does next to nothing with this premise either.

It's hard to think that anyone who went to see "The Cars that Ate Paris" - and certainly no one in the US who saw it as the even more misleadingly titled "The Cars that Eat People" - would have come away satisfied. It resolutely refuses to be of interest in any way, shape or form. Want horror? There's no tension and the only "shock" comes from photos of the results of grisly car crashes. Want art? The movie is shot fairly interestingly, just without anything interesting within the shots. Want cars, even weird looking cars, like the ones featured on the poster? The only car related action the movie really features happens in the final ten minutes.

Like I said, there's not really a whole lot to like here.