Dueling Banjos was made famous by the 1972 film "Deliverance," which also led to a successful lawsuit by the song's composer, as it was used in the film without Smith's permission. The film version was arranged and recorded by Eric Weissberg and Steve Mandell, but only credited to Weissberg on a single subsequently issued in December 1972. It went to #2 for four weeks on the "Billboard" Hot 100 in 1973, all four weeks behind Roberta Flack's "Killing Me Softly with His Song," and topped the adult contemporary chart for two weeks the same year. It reached #1 for one week on
Fear in the Night (1972 film) conceived the pairing as a marketing tool, stating: "My original concept was to have two properties by the same author on a central theme, being made into two films both directed by the same person." The film later premiered as a double bill with the Hammer film "Demons of the Mind" in the United States on 18 October 1972, in conjunction with the Halloween season. Time Out called the film "one of those neatly constructed but slightly mechanical psycho-thrillers which make you feel as if someone is pushing buttons connected to electrodes in your brain", but that "Hammer fans will