Life on the Road – Trucking News Blog

Mom doesn’t like to fly alone so I went with her to Ft Worth last weekend to visit my sister. As GATS was going on, and I cant handle the walking around an event like that requires right now, I sent my brother-in-law out to wrangle me a ticket to the “Drive and Deliver” premier. He and I went down to see the movie.

I have to say, its pretty hard to impress a couple of old company drivers with a truck, but this documentary is well-put together and accurately reflects the long-haul lifestyle in several realistic yet sensitive vignettes. People may call this “branded entertainment”, but International has done a really good job with this documentary. The camera work is excellent and the road scenery makes every driver start looking for familiar landmarks (we all know you cant watch a movie with a highway in it that doesnt make you automatically try to identify your location). The editing is a credit to a talented director. No special effects needed, plenty of scenery and excellent selection of strategic shots.

First, the Truck

The LoneStar is a MAN’S TRUCK!-just ask my brother-in-law! It’s something about the chrome. Chrome apparently interacts with testosterone and causes that glazed look in these guy’s eyes. I know my brother-in-law was hooked immediately. Actually I thought it looked pretty cool, but I was more impressed with the front axle suspension. I tend to not believe hype, but it’d be awfully darned hard to get those rolling camera shots as steady as they are in this documentary without some great suspension! All in all, the LoneStar is a great looking truck if it performs half as well as these drivers are claiming mileage wise, it will be the owner operator dream truck of the decade. And, the gals will envy the owners of this beautiful ride, too. More and more women are becoming owner-operators every day. Are ya listening, International? Maybe a different color scheme?

The Drivers

The documentary follows Steve, Tim and Chris as they ‘borrow’ the LoneStar for a week to drive and deliver. For once, a trucking movie where there are no truck stop hookers, no bad-mouth CB chatter and nobody said, “…and then, I called the Federal Marshalls. .”! Nobody gets a ticket, nobody does anything really stupid and has to be rescued by Supertrucker. Instead, these guys are regular Joes, just working hard, trying to provide for their families and make ends meet. They show their softer side, their generous side, their loving side. They talk about the cost of fuel, the difficult times away from family and the joys and losses of their lives. Every trucker will find the scrap paper loads, the pallet yards and the dock behind the light pole all too familiar. The canceled loads, the waiting and the ‘hurry up and get here yesterday’ are so true to life and should be required viewing for every wannabe truck driver, their wives and their legislators. This would be a good DVD to pick up to give to anybody curious about the lifestyle and will dis-abuse many of false beliefs about drivers and their work lives.

Steve, Tim and Chris are our friends, the guy in the next truck, the driver at the loading dock and ourselves. They’re real people, showing real human feelings and likely a few failings too. The only thing missing in this documentary is the women, are ya listening, International? I’d like to see this documentary extended into a feature length film with more drivers and more everyday challenges. Because this is a valuable story that needs to be told. This is a story about a glamorous truck and an unglamorous lifestyle. It shows truckers as they really are hard working, decent and human. It’s clean showers and dirty gloves, a welcoming bunk and the last bleary eyed mile in the rain. It puts a positive human face on the driver behind the deliveries and treats him as a worthy and worthwhile human being. It could go far to bolster the public image of truckers in the eye of the public. When the DVD comes out, it would be money well spent to buy a few copies and distribute them to people you KNOW don’t understand the job, maybe your dispatcher?