Eat My Dust

Eat My Dust (1976)

A Very Funny Car.

Hoover Nielbold is a car-crazy teenager who, in order to impress the hottest girl in school, takes her for a ride in a souped-up race car owned by local racer Big Bubba Jones. Hoover's father Harry, who's also the local sheriff is furious at the situation and orders his bumbling deputies to go after him. With the Sheriff's office overflowing with concerned parents and citizens and his deputies failing to catch him. He enlists the help of Jones and fellow racers to capture him. It culminates in a thrilling car chase finale through the rural countryside.

Date of release
1976-04-01
TMDB
5.8 / 10 (22)
Runtime
1h 29m
Genres
Action
Director
Charles B. Griffith

Casting

Interesting facts

Eat My Dust! is a 1976 American action comedy film written and directed by Charles B. Griffith and starring Ron Howard. The film depicts a conflict between a sheriff and his rebellious son over a stolen car.

Production

The movie was originally called The Car. It was Charles B. Griffith's first film as director since Forbidden Island (1959), although he had directed as second unit on a number of movies such as The Young Racers, The She Beast, and Death Race 2000; the last had been a huge hit for Roger Corman.

Corman offered the lead role of the film to Ron Howard, who was nationally famous from the TV series Happy Days. He sent Howard a script, with the offer of a fee of $75,000. The actor read it on the set of Happy Days and "thought it was terrible: a broad, zany car-chase comedy with weak jokes and cardboard characters." Howard wanted to move into directing, though, and knew that Roger Corman might be able to help him do that.

I like to think I turn out directors the way USC turns out running backs for the NFL.... Here's the deal: I won't promise you that you'll direct the movie, but I promise you that you can write an outline for another script if you act in Eat My Dust, and if I like it, I'll develop it. And if I like it enough and you're willing to be in it, you can direct it.

Howard agreed to star in Eat My Dust!. The movie was shot around Howard's schedule for Happy Days. Corman agreed to finance Ron Howard's idea for a film which became Grand Theft Auto (1977), Howard's directorial debut.

Charles Griffith directed the film, which was shot in four weeks, although Howard's scenes were done in only 10 days. It was originally titled The Car, and Griffith says he only suggested Eat My Dust! as a joke, but the marketing department at New World loved it. Barbara Peeters shot second unit.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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