Halloween 2013: Road Trip Horror ~ The Hitcher & More Terrible Trips

One of the most frightening road trip movies I have ever seen has to be The Hitcher (1986).  I was seventeen and a senior in high school when it came out, and had just learned to drive when my friend and I went to see this terrifying thriller.

Jim Halsey (C. Thomas Howell) is doing a driveaway (when you drive someone else's car somewhere for them, like perhaps across the country when someone moves, etc.) when he sees a hitchhiker along the side of the road.  Like any idiot would, he picks up the man (Rutger Hauer in one of his most menacing roles) who introduces himself as John Ryder.

At first Ryder seems friendly, making small talk and thanking Jim for the ride. But when they pass a disabled vehicle his mood shifts, and he ends up telling Jim that he killed the driver of the car and has similar plans for Jim.  Petrified, Jim asks what he can do to prevent his untimely death, to which Ryder responds simply:
"I want you to stop me."

A bit of luck has Jim being able to quite literally kick Ryder from the car and onto the highway, and after a brief glimmer of satisfaction, Jim drives by a family in a station wagon and sees Ryder in the back seat with two young children.  He tries to warn the family by driving along side but ends up having an accident that throws the car off the highway.  Soon after, he sees the car abandoned on the side of the road, with visible blood seeping out the doors and windows.

Carrying on from there, The Hitcher is at heart a tale of survival, as Jim keeps running into Ryder on his trip and it becomes painfully obvious that the menacing killer is always one step ahead of Jim, and has firm plans to end his life.

 No part of the movie is without tension. For example, Jim stops at a diner to eat and meets the very cute Nash (Jennifer Jason Leigh), who convinces him to call the police.  But alas, when he is served finger fries instead of french fries, he realizes Ryder is still after him.  Then, poor Jim is framed as the serial killer and when he wakes up in jail, all the officers have been murdered.  After leaving the station he is forced to confront the thought that Ryder is never going to stop until someone kills him, which is seemingly what Ryder wants - he enjoys the game and feels he's found a worthy adversary in Jim.

With Nash now  in tow, Jim continues on his search for the lunatic, who is always around the next bend, it seems.

There is no way I'd spoil the ending for anyone who hasn't already seen this excellent 80's thriller.  Suffice it to say that psychotic stalker Ryder has basically challenged Jim to kill him, and is going to try everything in his power to convince him to do so, adding to the cat and mouse effect that the film does so well. 

It should be noted that I have never, not even once, picked up a hitchhiker. I have this movie to thank.


MORE ROAD TRIP HORROR:  Because I couldn't possibly highlight all the road horror that is out there, here are some more films that deserve a mention...

*The Vanishing (1988)
A man searches for his lost love who comes up missing after a stop at a roadside gas station/store. I've reviewed this stellar film already and you can check it out HERE.  And forget the remake, please.

*Joyride 2
Sequel to the far-superior Joyride, two couples on a cross country trip have their own run-in with Rusty Nail.  A few more words about it HERE.

*Duel (1971)
The definitive road-horror film, this Spielberg-directed film from the Richard Matheson story is a grueling trip of terror.  Dennis Weaver stars as a man terrorized by a menacing trucker on a long stretch of highway.

*Black Cadillac (2003)
Three friends driving in the back woods of Wisconsin are stalked and terrorized by a black cadillac hell bent on harm. Apparently this is based on a real event in the writer/director's past.

*The Hills Have Eyes (1977)
A family on vacation is traveling through the desert and are sabotaged by a family of disfigured cannibals looking for their next meal.  A decent remake came in 2006.

*Dead End (2003)
A man (Ray Wise) driving his family to a Christmas dinner at the in-laws takes a short cut that turns out to be an ill-advised, supernatural-laden excursion that pretty much ruins the holiday.

*House of Wax (2005)
In a complete departure from the Vincent Price classic, a group of friends take a road trip to a college football game and get sidetracked by a tour of a ghost town highlighted by the titular house of wax. You can find my blurb about this one HERE.

*Rest Stop: Don't Look Back (2006)
This (pretty awful) sequel finds a young man and a few friends heading out on the highway to track down his brother and his bro's missing girlfriend. I've reviewed this one HERE.

*An American Werewolf in London (1981)
While not traveling by car, this film is still a road trip at heart, as two friends are backpacking across Europe and have the misfortune of being attacked by a werewolf on the moors of England. One of my favorite films, reviewed HERE.

*The Canyon (2009)
A couple's vacation to the Grand Canyon goes belly-up when a ride on horses through the vast park finds them with the tour guide from hell, rattlesnake problems, and worse yet: wolf problems.  Morphing into a true "survival" film in the last act, I've already discussed this film HERE.

*Hostel: Part II (2007)
One of the better sequels finds a group of female tourists traversing Europe and ending up in the same factory of horrors that found the first Hostel group sold off to the highest bidder for the most gruesome of ends.

*Hush (2009)
Equal parts Breakdown and Joy Ride, this British film is a cat and mouse thriller that doesn't really bring anything new to the table but it still worth a look.

*Psycho (1960)
For the first part of this classic, it is truly a road movie, it can't be denied.  Marion Crane senselessly rips off a boat-load of money from her employer and takes to the road, stopping at an out-of-the-way roadside motel where she meets both Norman Bates...and his mother. I've written about Psycho countless times, for many sites including my own. But HERE's a review if you really need to read one.

*Bunnyman (2011)
What do you get when you have a group of friends terrorized while driving along a desolate stretch of highway? Every other road film we've discussed already. The difference?  The maniacal killer is wearing a rabbit costume. Yup.

Halloween 2013: Road Trip Horror ~ Jeepers Creepers & Carriers

 One of the better horror films to come out of the 2000's was Victor Salva's Jeepers Creepers (2001).  It may be slightly underrated, but as I see it, it has a lot going for it by way of originality, a creepy monster/villain, and decent acting by the two leads.  It stalls out in the last act a bit, but it delivers some real thrills in the first half of the movie.  Certainly one of the more entertaining road-trip horror films out there.

Darry and Trish are traveling home from college on a long stretch of deserted road, playing your average stupid car games and endlessly picking on each other. The relationship between the two siblings is really one of the highlights of the film, as they really have a hilarious bickering session that everyone with a brother or sister can relate to! As they are driving, a crazed driver in a rusty, big old truck flies up on their ass and tries to run them off the road, madly honking its horn.

After scaring the living shit out of Darry & Trish, they gather their senses and continue on. Rattled, Trish recalls the story of a teenage couple that went missing along the same stretch of road and they were never found.  As they reminisce about the unsettling story, they drive past an old abandoned church where they see the truck stopped. They slow down and are appalled to see someone in a long trench coat dumping what could only be a body, wrapped in a sheet, down a large pipe adjacent to the church.  The driver does take note of them watching him, and soon is on their heels trying to run them off the road again.  He manages to accomplish it this time, and flies past them honking the horn as their car settles along the side of the road.

Soon Darry begins to question Trish about returning to the church.  His conscious won't let him ignore the fact that someone could be in danger or near death. There was no mistaking what they saw, and with that rationalization the two end up looking down the pipe to see what they can find.  Unfortunately, due to basic brain malfunction, Darry falls down the pipe.  What he discovers down there is beyond all comprehension.

Up to this point, it's all pretty exciting. Where the film fails is when other people start to enter the picture, such as the local police (who are just about as laughable as you'd expect), an absurd psychic who has visions of the future, and a crazy cat lady who really doesn't belong in the film at all - her inclusion is merely filler, though it's always nice to see (the late) Eileen Brennan.

All this is before you really even see the "creeper" driving the rusty truck, who is a piece of work all by himself.  It's hard to say just exactly what the creeper is. Suffice it to say he's an aberrant monster - looking something like the Dilophosaurus from Jurassic Park with John Jarratt's Wolf Creek hat.  His looks are not the strangest thing about him, however.  What remains one of the more bizarre monster quirks in horror is that the Creeper only feeds every 23 years, and fact is: he can smell your fear!  Ok, seriously!

Regardless, the film is to be commended for the fear factor it evokes in the first part of the movie. Darry and Trish are a typical pair of siblings and their fear is palpable as they traverse down this highway of death, and the Creeper is genuinely terrifying as he tries to run them off the road.  There are many other moments that frighten, including the 'down the pipe' scene, a few minutes in a cornfield, and the tense, unsettling feeling that Darry and Trish get when the Creeper has just rooted through their vehicle when they stop at a diner to call for help.

If you can get past the less than stellar ending, Jeepers Creepers is a fun, original flick that is among the best of the road-horror offerings out there.

MORE ROAD-TRIP HORROR:

Carriers (2009) 

Tales of apocalyptic horror seem to be a dime a dozen lately, and Carriers feels like a cross between 28 Days Later, The Road (2009), and TV's The Walking Dead.  While we are not specifically talking zombies here, the ruins of the world depicted here are similar without a doubt.

The world has already been decimated by a pandemic of epic proportions.  Traveling to the beach they knew and loved as kids, Brian (Chris Pine) and Danny (Lou Taylor Pucci) grab up their girlfriends Bobby (Piper Perabo) and Kate (Emily Van Camp) and try to weave through a sea of infected victims they encounter along the way. Subsequently, they meet Frank (Christopher Meloni) and his daughter Jodie (Kiernan Shipka), who is very ill.  Fate compels them to combine forces and so the group keeps going until they stop off at a school where a supposed cure is available.

Naturally, things go awry on this road trip, leaving more infected than not, and the search for an exit from all the agony and death seems unattainable for much of the film.  For this reason Carriers seems extraordinarily bleak, even for apocalyptic horror.  You can't get a sense of everything turning out all right like you do with some films, so I can imagine for some people it would be either boring or too morose.

But the acting here is quite satisfactory, despite a sparse script.  Pine is good, but his meek brother played by Pucci is actually the better of the two. Chris Meloni as a heartbroken and desperate dad is admirable, and you will be wishing for a happy ending for him and his little girl - which all along you know is not going to happen.

By all accounts a very grim road movie, the further our group gets down the road they get to the beach, the more progressive their problems seem to get.
Soon, there is no accounting for morals or manners or even loyalty as the group fights among themselves and others.
Their disillusionment in mankind, as well as for an actual cure to the disease, is ever-apparent, making for a depressing yet compelling character study.

Perhaps little seen, Carriers is one to watch, as long as you're not in a despondent mood...because this is NOT going to facilitate happiness.

Halloween 2013: Road Trip Horror ~ Scenic Route & Wind Chill

Scenic Route  (2013) is a film recently recommended to me by a friend and it happens to fit perfectly into this week's theme of road trip horror, because this is a prime example.

Mitchell (Josh Duhamel) and Carter (Dan Fogler) are two life-long friends who are on a road trip through, for an indeterminable reason, Death Valley.  When fate hits hard, Carter's old pick-up truck breaks down, leaving them in one of the hottest locations in the United States to be stuck in.  Tempers quickly flare and tension replaces nostalgia as the two bicker about the crippled vehicle and why this specific route was chosen in the first place.

When help arrives, Carter shoos them away hastily, and fesses up to Mitchell that he set the breakdown up by messing with some wires. Aghast, Mitchell begins cursing and demands to know why Carter - or anyone - would do such a thing, and in the desert to boot.  Carter tries to reason his way out of it by exclaiming that it was the only way he could get Mitchell's attention so that he could talk to him about the life choices Mitchell has made. 
Once determined to make it playing guitar for a living, Mitchell is now married to someone he impulsively hooked up with after a bad break-up and has ended up with a wife, a child, a mortgage, and a decent yet tedious career - all of which at first it seems Carter is insanely jealous of.  So he engineered the truck mishap to have some alone time with his BFF.

Unfortunately, when Carter attempts to reconnect the wires and get the truck moving again, it is no quick fix. In fact, it simply will not start. So there the two friends sit, in the scalding heat of a Death Valley afternoon, arguing.  Carter makes a case for the "old" Mitchell - the one who had dreams and ambitions, not the guy sitting beside him who settled for the ordinary.  Countering, Mitchell complains that Carter has never done anything with his life, that though he wants to be a writer he has no talent, has no permanent home, drives a piece of shit truck, and has no love in his life because of his actions.  The acting of the two leads here is so true to life and believable you may think you've heard yourself and your own bestie arguing the same exact points.

After long bouts of silence and Mitchell spending part of the night out in the desert cold, the two make amends (if only temporarily) and Mitchell confesses he recently cheated on his wife at a conference and admits his life is not what he had hoped. Honestly begins to show its face and soon they are laughing and Carter is cutting Mitchell's hair into a mohawk - something Mitchell always wanted but never had the guts to do.

But as the desert heat rises and the two run out of water, tensions rise and the inevitable fighting begins again. This time though, the quarrel escalates into a full-blown row, with harsh words and name calling that eventually becomes violent enough to come to blows.  The men attack each other with punching and kicking until Carter lies seemingly lifeless on the ground. At that point Mitchell reconsiders his life and the friendship (let alone the life ) he has possibly ended and when Carter does finally come around it becomes the entire film's turning point.

With all the arguing is out of the way, the film morphs into true survival mode.  The previous arguments and physical beatings seem very insignificant when you are fighting for your life.  The two men are out of food and water, are physically and emotionally drained, and there's not a soul in sight for miles.  They take to the desert on foot, intent on following the sun and finding their way out.

Both Duhamel and Fogler are pretty impressive here.  Fogler is the typical buffoon, the moronic best friend-type of guy who just sits around eating cheetos and strumming his ukelele and wishing his buddies didn't spend so much time with their wives. It can be overplayed, but Fogler does a decent job and is faithful to the stereotype. His Carter is so annoying at times that you think you might actually throw something at the television screen.  You've heard all his arguments before, but he'll tell you one more time anyway.  Duhamel is slightly more formidable, after having listened to his pal bitch about his wife, job, and the way he lives non-stop, he takes matters into his own hands, even using one of his crutches (from an ailment we know nothing about) to make his point.

In the end, Scenic Route is a power play between the two pals, both unable to completely let go of the things that keep them apart but equally as determined to keep their friendship alive. A road trip can already make or break a friendship, but throw in horrific conditions and bitter regrets and Death Valley isn't just the name of a park.

MORE ROAD TRIP HORROR:

Wind Chill  (2007) is more than a road trip film, it has supernatural elements that make it slightly more spooky than just a run-of-the-mill horror story.  We've mentioned this film once before, in our Winter Horror feature - you can check out the wise words of James Gracey HERE. But for now, let me just say you could do worse than this little-known tale of road trip horror. 

Without the benefit of names, our characters are simply boy and girl.  Girl (Emily Blunt) is heading home from college for the holidays and finds a ride-share with Boy (Ashton Holmes).  Girl is nothing other than ill-natured and doesn't readily converse with Boy, whose attempts at getting to know her fall on deaf ears. 

As the two drive through the snowy landscape, they end up taking an off-the-main-route road that Boy says is a short cut. She argues with him about this decision, and becomes uneasy when she sees what looks like multiple crosses and grave sites along the sides of the road.  When another car comes barreling towards them, they swerve erratically to miss it and end up in a snowbank.

As if wrecking in a snowstorm on a deserted road isn't bad enough, the supernatural strangeness starts when, upon searching for help, they run into what can only be called ghostly corpses that are compelled to live out their otherworldly existence reliving their untimely demises over and over again. Even worse, Boy may not be who he says he is.  This road trip just barreled full force ahead into nothing less than the twilight zone.

Halloween 2013: Road Trip Horror: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre & House of 1000 Corpses

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) and House of 1000 Corpses (2003) are two very different films yet have many similarities.  They both start out with a road trip and end with the maniacal actions of a deranged family. So it's kind of a demented daily double, if you will!

In Tobe Hooper's film, Sally Hardesty, along with her boyfriend Jerry, her brother Franklin, and a couple of other friends, are driving to a cemetery in east bumfuck Texas to check on the grave of Sally's grandfather. There have been reports of vandalism and grave robbing so the group makes it a road trip with intents to check out the previous home of the Hardesty family while there.  On the way they pick up a hitchhiker - as was common back in the 70's - but soon find that the hitcher is a bona fide freak-show. He blabbers about working at the local slaughterhouse and how his family likes to make and eat head cheese...until everyone is about as uneasy and disgusted as you can get.  When he lights a photo on fire inside the van and then cuts himself with a razor, the gang throws him out of the van.  It's not going so well..

Already the road trip from hell, when Sally & co. reach the old homestead, the couple of the group decides to explore the grounds and end up finding a house. Once they venture inside, the most gruesome of fates await them in the form of one Leatherface (Gunnar Hansen) and the rest of the hitchhiker's deranged family.  When the others come looking, they too are subjected to various horrors-- not the least of which is a bloody chainsaw.

The vision of final girl Sally, hopping into the back of that pickup and making her escape from the insane family, is one of sheer terror - and her laughing echoes through the head of anyone watching it.  It seems fairly unlikely that Sally will be taking any more road trips any time soon.

In House of 1000 Corpses, Rob Zombie introduces us to the Firefly family, a psychotic bunch of loonies that take great pleasure in kidnapping unsuspecting travelers to their house of horrors and treating them to a rousing visit with the infamous Dr. Satan.

When Jerry, Bill, Mary, and Denise are traveling around looking for additions to a book of weird roadside attractions that they are compiling, they come across Captain Spauling, the proprietor of a gas station that doubles for a museum of monsters and mayhem, which boasts a "murder ride".  Naturally Jerry and Bill drag the girls on the carnival-type dark ride, getting a tour of various famous murderers including Ed Gein, Albert Fish, Lizzie Borden, and local legend Dr. Satan.  After the ride, the quartet leave the gas station, invigorated by its bizarre atmosphere. As in Tx. Chainsaw, they too pick up a hitchhiker, this time in the form of the beautiful Sheri Moon-Zombie, playing the giggling Baby Firefly.

Soon, as in most films of this type, they get the obligatory flat tire (I'd love a count of how many road horror films have the car actually break down - has to happen in 75% of them!) and Baby offers her brother's assistance. He lives right down the road...just a little ways.

At the Firefly residence, again as in Tx Chainsaw, the group is subjected to horror after horror by the madcap (and totally unbalanced and murderous) Fireflys.  Baby's brother, Otis (Bill Moseley), has designs that don't just border on bizarre, they are completely crazy. He enjoys making weird works of art out of body parts and screaming in their faces about Dr. Satan finishing the job.

Both these films are cautionary tales in their own right, meant to scare the shit out of people and hopefully keep you from 1) picking up hitchhikers  2) exploring places that you should just leave well enough alone and 3) hitting the road to look for trouble.  The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is a genuine classic, banned in several countries upon its release, yet not nearly as bloody as other films of its time.  It's a road trip to hell from which there is no return. And House of 1000 Corpses is a psychedelic trip to the outer reaches of sanity, complete with clowns, mermen, and a murder ride. Not exactly the vacation you were hoping for...

Halloween 2013: Road Trip Horror ~ Wolf Creek & Hostel

Wolf Creek  is a brutal film from 2005 that explores all that can go wrong when you put your lives in the hands of a stranger.  I doubt anyone who saw it would have any desire to head to the Australian outback for a "walkabout" any time soon. 

The true events the film claims to be based on happened back in the summer of 2001 when a man and his girlfriend were assaulted and abducted by one Bradley John Murdock, an Australian now serving life in prison for the murder of said backpacker Peter Falconio, whose body has still never been found.

The first fifteen to twenty minutes of Wolf Creek  have you wondering when something is going to actually happen, but the wait is painfully worth it.  Two women, Brits Liz Hunter (Cassandra Magrath) and Kristy Earl (Kestie Morassi) join their Aussie buddy Ben Mitchell (Nathan Phillips) on a backpacking trip in the Australian outback (which seems like a really bad idea, from all the films I've seen). They end up driving up to a national park, Wolf Creek, where there is a huge crater that was formed by a meteorite. This interests them, so they stop off to see the novelty of it. Perhaps unrelated, Ben and Liz finally express their previously held-back feelings by exchanging a kiss. Ahh, things appear to be going swimmingly for our trio!

Until they notice that for some reason their watches are all broken and their car won't start (aliens??). They seem in quite a bind until help shows up by way of a typical Aussie fellow, aptly named Mick, who offers to fix their vehicle but then alarms them by telling them it's worse than he thought. HOWEVER...he can repair it! All they need do is let him tow them back to his humble abode where he has some parts and will fix them up toot sweet!  Why sure! And they're off.

Back at Mick's (slightly frightening) remote home, they sit 'round the campfire and he chats them up about various subjects, all the while drugging the water he offers them. When Liz awakes she is tied up in a shed, and after breaking free she discovers Mick torturing Kristy, and no sign of Ben at all.

Wolf Creek is a stark reminder of the dangers of accepting help, even in the form of a friendly enough looking gent.  Granted their options were limited, and most of us would likely have done the same thing. But as they say in Pet Sematary..sometimes, dead is better.

In the film, a chilling portrayal of evil personified is given by John Jarrett, playing Mick Taylor.  His seemingly friendly persona is quickly destroyed when we see him pull out a giant knife.  There are signs, of course, that he is one fry short of a happy meal, but in the end there was probably no escape from his wrath.  The Australian outback is one of the most dangerous places on earth - just from the conditions and wild creatures that could be your end - let alone a psychopath with a big knife and a bad attitude.  Stay home, people.  Or at least get a decent, reliable car.

For your enjoyment, another round (Wolf Creek 2 ) is apparently hitting the big screen in early 2014. 
Did we learn nothing about foreign travel?

MORE ROAD TRIP HORROR: 

Hostel  (2005) may not be considered typical road trip horror, as most think of being in a car when they think road trip, but three friends traveling across Europe more than qualifies. I've written a bit about this film in the past, and you can check that out HERE.

Pax (Jay Hernandez) and Josh (Derek Richardson) hook up with Oli in Europe and begin their tour of bedding as many ladies as humanly possible across the continent.  When they hear of beautiful women in Slovakia that are just waiting for someone to jump their bones, they jump on the train and head to the hostel that will be their downfall.

Hostel, in its day, slid horror fans into a new sub-genre of film, the so-called torture porn.  But with this violent and (at the time) surprising film, Eli Roth opened up a new door. And it's a blood-soaked, incredibly grim door. 

But while it is basically a film that focuses on torture, it's also a not-so-friendly reminder of the dangers of world travel.  These boys just throw all caution to the wind and follow the call of their dicks. Putting trust in total strangers puts them smack in the middle of a ring of kidnappers who sell their victims to the highest bidder to do with whatever they so choose. Which ends up a disturbing, bloody mess.

Traveling in other countries can be frightening enough without worrying about being kidnapped or killed by foreigners. It's not easy to extricate yourself from those kinds of situations, and most likely you end up dead... or a head on a stick.

Halloween 2013: Road Trip Horror: Breakdown & Wrong Turn

Breakdown (1997)  isn't exactly a horror movie, but the elements of terror within the film certainly led me to include it here.

Kurt Russell plays Jeff Taylor, a man who with his wife Amy (Kathleen Quinlan), is moving from Boston to San Diego and have their brand new Jeep to get them there. Unfortunately it breaks down, leaving them at the mercy of the highway.

En route across the country, Jeff and Amy nearly crash into a pick-up truck driving erratically. Later at a gas station, the asshole driver of the truck and Jeff exchange some heated barbs before heading on their way.


As mentioned, the new Jeep breaks down in the Arizona desert, leaving the couple stranded.  When a long-distance truck driver hauling a big rig offers his assistance, Jeff allows Amy to take the ride with driver Red Barr (the late, great J.T. Walsh) to a diner just up the road while he stays behind with their beloved Jeep.  (I'm sensing this was his first grave error).

 When Jeff figures out the Jeep was apparently messed with at the gas station, he is able to get the vehicle running and soon arrives at the diner, only to be told no one has seen his wife.  In serious shades of the excellent film, The Vanishing (1988), Jeff becomes more and more disturbed when he cannot find Amy.  He heads back out on the road and finally catches up to the 18-wheeler. When Red stops, he acts as though he's never seen Jeff before, and claims to have no idea where Amy is.

The entire course of the film after this moment is the search for Jeff's missing wife. And if you think that cannot possibly be enough to sustain suspense, you'd be wrong.  Breakdown is a white-knuckle thriller at times, and there is more than enough action to keep you awake throughout. The chase scenes are well done and with zero CGI to boot, and that's saying something.

Plot-wise, I can't say it's complex, but it is absorbing and exciting. The lengths that Jeff goes to just to get a single piece of pertinent information, or to try to thwart the devious plans of Red and his accomplices makes for an energetic story line.

At times you think the possibility exists that Amy has concocted an elaborate scheme just to leave Jeff, but then in the next scene your mind wanders back to the thought that this is a flat-out kidnapping to extort money from a couple that made themselves so obviously transparent.

There are a heaping handful of chase scenes, and like Spielberg's fabulous Duel  before it, your heart jumps out of your chest more than once while watching. The cast of characters all do a fine job with the script, with extra kudos to Walsh for being such an incredible son-of-a-bitch.

While we are  asked to suspend our disbelief in the outrageous ending, it still feels really satisfying - because really, would anyone want to see Kurt Russell fail?
I thought not.

MORE ROAD TRIP HORROR: 

Wrong Turn  (2003) is actually one of my favorite guilty pleasure horror flicks, as I think it is unfairly judged and of course there is the ridiculous amount of pointless sequels it has spawned...but to me it's a pretty amusing addition to both road-trip horror and backwoods cannibal horror. 

With some good performances by Desmond Harrington as Chris and Eliza Dushku as Jessie, it tells the story of a group of friends heading off on a camping trip to cheer up Jessie - who just had her heart broken.  They get into a car accident with med student Chris as he rushes to a conference along a back road in the mountains of West Virginia. Soon the group realizes the tires have been slashed by barbed wire most likely strung along the road on purpose.

As is certain to happen in most horror films, the crew splits up, leaving token stoner couple Evan (Kevin Zegers) and Francine (Lindy Booth) behind with the car while the rest search for help.  In an even more ludicrous move, Evan seeks out the source behind a strange noise in the woods, never to return.  Francine finds only his shoe and his ear upon looking for him. She then is collared by barbed wire and hoisted off to her death.

When the others find a ramshackle house and investigate (there are so many no-no cliches happening here it's ridiculous), they are subjected to obvious signs of cannibalism.  The rest of the film has our soon-to-be-victims running for their lives from these anthropophagites, trying not to become their next meal.

While I can't call it a classy film (are there any "classy" cannibal films?), I can call it fun, and this road trip to paradise didn't exactly turn out that well.  No one even had time to squeal like a pig.

Halloween 2013: Road Trip Horror ~ Joyride & Rest Stop

These next two weeks, Marie and I have decided to each take a whole week and highlight another specific theme. My week is first, and I give you: Road Trip Horror. 

Ahh, the road trip.  A peaceful getaway to the mountains. A jaunt from city to city on business. A drive cross country just for the fun of it.  An escape by two lovers for some quiet time. A vacation with family. A road trip with friends to celebrate the holidays....  It's always fun to get away. Right?

Maybe not.  Road trips can wreak havoc on every last nerve in your brain. Traveling with friends, family, and/or loved ones can put undue pressure on even the calmest of folks.  But throw in a maniacal killer or a begrudged motorist and you're pretty much doomed.

So.
Who hasn't pulled what they thought was an innocent prank and found out later that it meant more to your victim than meets the eye?  We've all done stupid things in our past.  Hell, some of us might be doing foolish things right now.  But when a prank has devastating consequences, it's more than we bargained for and we're ill prepared for the repercussions.

Just as Lewis (Paul Walker) is about to fly home from college for the summer, he chats with Venna (Leelee Sobieski), a crush of his that he is trying to strike up a relationship with.  She tells him about her recent break-up and lack of a ride home for summer break, which of course sparks an idea.  He sells his airline ticket and buys a piece of crap car, telling her he is driving cross country and will pick her up - no problem at all!

On his way to meet Venna, he gets a call from his mother telling him that his delinquent brother Fuller (Steve Zahn) has been released from prison. When he sidetracks to pick him up from jail, Fuller decides it would be a great idea to hitch that ride home with Lewis and take some more flak from the parents for all the shit he's gotten himself into.  Somewhat reluctantly, Lewis agrees.

At a gas station/truck stop, Fuller buys an old CB, much to the chagrin of Lewis.  Soon they begin engaging in some harmless banter with a mysterious truck driver known only by his handle: Rusty Nail.  Doing his best impression of a sexy female trucker, Lewis jump starts Rusty Nail's libido by hinting at a possible interlude at an upcoming motel stop. As "Candy Cane", Lewis lures the trucker to room 17, one room down from the room of the two brothers. Upon check in to room 18, Lewis and Fuller have a brief run-in with a ridiculously rude businessman, who secures the actual room 17.

The prank goes all wrong when they hear Rusty Nail wake the businessman by knocking on motel room number 17.  The brothers hear a nasty argument and attack next door and find out the following morning that the businessman is in the hospital on life support due to wounds from a violent beating.

And so continues the road trip from hell.  Once on the highway again, Fuller and Lewis hear Rusty Nail over the airwaves, asking for Candy Cane.  The boys fess up to the prank, but somebody isn't taking it so well.  When they pick up Venna, things only get worse, and what started out as a joke has them running for their lives from the deranged trucker.

Who hasn't played a stupid joke on someone, not really meaning anything by it?  We all have, right?  Well this film certainly shows you what can happen when the tables are turned. Lewis and Fuller become the hunted, forced to play along with Rusty Nail and his very warped sense of humor, which only gets worse as the days go on.  Even as they try to escape the crazed killer, he keeps ratcheting up the terror, always seeming to be one step ahead of the trio. The silliest of counterplay (having the brothers walk naked into a truck stop and order cheeseburgers) turns into the scariest of retributions when first Venna's friend is kidnapped, then Venna herself becomes victimized, all to get a rise out of the two brothers.

Equal parts The Hitcher and Duel, Joyride is a tense outing, with some humor sprinkled in here and there. The cast is very engaging, and the evil trucker becomes quite malevolent in the end. It's obvious he's come completely undone, set upon vengeance for the silly prank that made him look a little stupid.  Some folks just can't take a joke.

MORE ROAD TRIP HORROR:  The much maligned Rest Stop, which I have previously reviewed HERE, is another example of bad shit happening when you hit the road.  In this case Nicole is a young woman who is heading off to California with her boyfriend, Jess. They stop off for some quick nookie (witnessed by a creep in a yellow pick-up truck) and then head to the nearest roadside rest to take care of other business.

When Nicole returns to the car, she finds Jess gone.  After looking around thoroughly she starts to panic, which is pretty much the correct expression, as the deranged idiot in the yellow pick up truck drives by and throws Jess's cell phone at her and speeds off. 

And so begins Nicole's never-ending nightmare as the truck driver keeps coming back to the rest stop to attempt to kill her. The film is certainly no prize (probably why it is a "Mindless Movie Monday" addition), but it's worth mentioning because there is no doubt all of us have stopped off at a less than sanitary rest area at least once in our lives.  And we never think about anything bad happening there.... Maybe we should.