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?!

It seems that anyone who ventures near the town of Paris (Australia) ends up the victim of an auto accident; this, it turns out, is good for Business in the town of Paris. Coincidence? When Arthur Waldo's brother is killed in an auto accident which Arthur himself survives, the town decides to "keep" him. Arthur, it turns out, has a phobia about driving: a manslaughter charge resulted in the loss his license, and he's been unable to get behind the wheel of a car ever since. Meanwhile, other "accidents" have been occurring and the survivors given over to the local doctor, who conducts experiments on them. Among the townsfolk is the dim-witted Charlie (Bruce Spence, who played the gyro pilot in THE ROAD WARRIOR), who's eager to blow away anybody who wanders into his line of fire. He has a ghoulish collection of hood ornaments taken from the cars of his victims. When Arthur tries to leave the town, a pair of cars with engines revving menacingly bar his way. He returns to town and is told that he has "brain damage" and "a fear of cars... But that's the world we live in- the world of the motor car." If THE CARS THAT ATE Paris has one major failing, it's the lack of characterization(s): we never really get to know or care about anyone, especially our hero, Arthur. The climax deserves mention, wherein a group of ROAD WARRIORs engage in a DEATH RACE 2000 type of all-out automotive mayhem in which entire buildings are run into the ground.

Boy, was I ever let down by this lousy, low-budget piece of Australian junk.From start to finish, this film continually struck me as being equivalent to a limp-wristed project carelessly slapped together by some incompetent, ass-backwards film students from Idiots-ville.Filled to over-flowing with lifeless, unattractive characters, rambling dialogue, terrible acting and long, "WTF?" stretches where absolutely nothing happens, The Cars That Ate Paris's title was, without question, about 10x more intriguing than was the result of its dumb and virtually humorless story.This is one of those truly grate-on-your-nerves films where right from the word "go!" one immediately senses that its scriptwriters were trying way too hard to elevate this one to the status of a bizarre & quirky "Cult" film. But, they failed miserably.I've got nothing, whatsoever, good to say about this dreary & asinine picture. Even its much-anticipated final climax (where the cars come to eat Paris) was totally anti-climatic. In fact, this finale was downright stupid.Thank goodness for the joy of fast-forwarding!

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.