Wheels on Reels: Two-Lane Blacktop

Museum of Fine Arts, Houston presents Wheels on Reels. The MFAH exhibition Sculpted in Steel: Art Deco Automobiles and Motorcycles, 1929–1940 inspires this series of classic movies that celebrate memorable cars and their drivers.

Two-Lane Blacktop

Directed by Monte Hellman
1971
USA
102 minutes
35mm

This cult favorite is an existential road move about a cross-country race between sociopath G.T.O. (Warren Oates), in a souped-up Pontiac, and hippie gearheads played by musicians James Taylor and Dennis Wilson.

Taylor survives on earnings from winning races while Wilson is his mechanic. Behind the wheel of their 1955 Chevy, the pair agrees to race G.T.O. from New Mexico to the east coast.

One reason Texas filmmaker Richard Linklater loves this movie is “Because it’s like a western. The guys are like old-time gunfighters, ready to outdraw the quickest gun in town. And they don’t talk about the old flames they’ve had, but rather old cars they’ve had.”