Roadkill
Teen Action Road Thriller
Rating: 6/10
Running Time: 97 minutes
UK Certificate: 15
On DVD
Lewis Thomas (Walker) is driving to pick up girlfriend to be Venna (Sobieski) when he gets a phone call to say his brother has been arrested. He stops off along the way to bail Fuller (Zahn) out of jail.
You know immediately that Fuller is a bad penny, for where he goes, trouble always follows. The clean living Lewis gets dragged into a game where through his car's CB radio he pretends to be Candy Cane, an attractive woman that attracts the attention of the grizzly sounding Rusty Nail. Lewis (as Candy Cane) suggests that Rusty Nail pays her a visit at her motel room at midnight.
Hiding in the next room, Lewis and Fuller hear Rusty Nail arrive and amused by their prank, listen eagerly through the wall.
But their amusement quickly turns to terror. The boys find out the next morning that the original occupant of room 17 was found on the highway in a coma with his jaw torn out.
The brothers flee the scene intent on getting as much distance between them and Rusty Nail as possible. But Rusty Nail tracks them down and subjects them to a nightmare of terror as he pursues them, and when they finally pick up Venna, Rusty Nail seems intent on killing them all.
Roadkill (“Joy Ride” in the US) is a good film. Nicely suspenseful with some genuinely scary moments, the decent into the terror of the Walker boys is nicely portrayed. Only the rather confusing (and implausible) ending lets this film down.
It's Got: Nicely paced. Good male characters
It Needs: To have a more plausible storyline.
DVD Extras Good. 29 minutes of alternate endings and deleted scenes. Of course, theyre all pointless and it makes you wonder why they even bothered to film them. However they are mildly interesting if you enjoyed the film enough to want to see an entirely different ending. DVD Extras Rating: 6/10
Summary
Good. Roadkill maintains suspense nicely throughout, but I cant help but wonder how Rusty Nail keeps on tracking those boys down. A herculean effort on his part.