We watched the film Detour starring Tom Neal as Al and Ann Savage as Vera. Detour is about a piano player who lives in New York. He is in love and is going to see his women in California who went to pursue her dream of singing. He planned on getting to California by hitchhiking.  The second person’s car he got into was a man with a lot of money and a complicated life. Al ends up driving while the man sleeps. It starts raining and that is when Al realizes that the sleeping man is dead. Al hides the body and acts as he is the owner of the car. On his way to California he picks up a woman whose name is Vera. She knew the original owner of the car and integrated Al about where he is and what happen. Al tells the truth and she  doesn’t believe him at first but then realizes that she doesn’t care enough about the dead man and just wants more and ends up trying to help Al get rid of the car and acts as his wife so that they could stay together until everything was situated. Vera ends up being very greedy and wants Al to act as the dead man so that he could get money from the dead man’s family who he hasn’t seen in years. Al doesn’t want to do any of the things Vera wants to do and wants to see his women. Al ends up killing Vera by accident and leaves the place. He ends up getting caught at the end. 

The film was made with a low budget and was made in 6 days. The movie was interesting and I didn’t expect anything that happened in the film. He was innocently running to get to the women that he loves but ended up getting into a mess that he did not sign up for. Meeting Vera was helpful and dangerous at the same time. She helped him realize that he could get caught by leaving the car unintended but then she became hungry for money. Vera liked having control took it too far. Based on her character the quote “‘I was fighting with the most dangerous animal in the world, a woman” was created. Vera was a woman that fought for herself and didn’t let a man control her. Sadly, she ended up dead but her killer was caught. 

Walter Benjamin believed that in the era of mechanical reproduction, something happens to a work of art when it is reproduced. The Aura of at is lost. Technology changes everything. Authenticity is important and should be kept, but is lost when art is reproduced. He loved the social aspect of new things coming out of art.  “Since the historical testimony rests on the authenticity, the former, too, is jeopardized by reproduction when substantive duration ceases to matter.” The original should always be more important and should be preserved. When replicas are made value is lost.