American Thunder

A muscle car, in the usual definition, is a mid-size American coupe with a big V8 dropped in. Most histories start with the Pontiac GTO, an option package on the LeMans that arrived for the 1964 model year with a 389-cubic-inch V8.

Within a few years every Detroit maker had an answer: big-block Chevelles and Camaros from Chevrolet, the Cobra Jet Mustang from Ford, the Hemi Charger from Dodge, the Road Runner from Plymouth.

The era faded in the early 1970s, as insurance surcharges, tighter emissions rules and, in 1973, the oil embargo cut into the market.

The car in this scene comes straight at the viewer down an empty desert highway, headlights lit, a chrome bumper under a dark grille and spray flying up at the wheels. The sky is a slab of red-orange laid on thick, the sun sitting right above the roof, with red buttes on both horizons and flecks of blue, white and yellow thrown across the whole surface like gravel kicked up off the road.