Review #158: The Hitcher (2007)

Cast/Notable Credits:
Dave Meyers (Director)

Sean Bean (John Ryder): Patriot Games (1992), GoldenEye (1995), Ronin (1998), Don’t Say a Word (2001), LOTR Trilogy, Troy (2004), National Treasure (2004), The Island (2005), Flightplan (2005), Silent Hill (2006)

Sophia Bush (Grace): Van Wilder (2002), Stay Alive (2006), John Tucker Must Die (2006), One Tree Hill T.V. series

Zachary Knighton (Jim): Cherry Falls (2000)

Neal McDonough (Lt. Esteridge): Darkman (1990), Angels in the Outfield (1994), Star Trek 8 (1996), Walking Tall (2004), Flags of Our Fathers (2006), 88 Minutes (2007), I Know Who Killed Me, Boomtown & Band of Brothers T.V. series

Kyle Davis (Store Clerk): Friday the 13th

Trailer:

Plot:

The Hitcher is a remake of an early 80’s film by the same name. In the new version two college kids, Grace and Jim, head off to Lake Havasu from Texas on a road trip during spring break. While traveling on the road during a thunderstorm, they encounter a stranded motorist standing in the middle of the road during the night. Jim (driving) swerves to miss him and stalls the car.

Instead of checking out if the guy needs help, Grace pleas and convinces Jim that he’s creepy and they should just continue driving. Jim hesitantly agrees and the two take off leaving the man standing in the road during a down pour of rain. Jim decides that he will stop off at the next gas station and send help for the man.

Jim pulls off at the next gas station to fill up and tells the clerk that a guy needs some road assistance down the road. Jim begins to pump up the gas while Grace uses the little women’s room when a trucker driver pulls into the station. Guess who comes out of the passenger side of the truck? Yep, it was the mysterious motorist who was standing in the middle of the road.

At the store’s cashier counter, Jim apologizes to the man for not stopping to offer help. The man identifies himself as John Ryder. He forgives Jim and then asks for a lift about 20 miles up the road to a motel. Jim feeling shameful of his previous act agrees and the three of them venture off into the stormy night.

While back on the road again a few miles up the road, John and Jim have a less than cheerful chat which ends with John pulling a knife out on them and threatening to kill Grace. John gives Jim an ultimatum while holding Grace in a headlock. John wants Jim to say, “I want to die” or he’ll kill Grace.

While frightened and slowly repeating the words, Jim accelerates his car and then slams on the breaks. John hits his head against the front window. Jim and Grace kick and push John out of the car and then speed off leaving the man injured on the side of the road.

The two immediate decide that they should call the police, but Grace mentions that her cell phone is missing. Oh no! Not shockingly enough, the next scene shows her cell phone ringing in a puddle on the ground next to John Ryder.

Further down the road John eventually catches up with the two and even passes them while riding in the back of a station wagon as a hitchhiker in another couple’s car. Jim and Grace speed up to notify the couple that he’s a crazy man. One thing leads to another and Jim crashes his car leaving them stranded on the highway.

While walking along the highway Jim and Grace both catch up with the station wagon only to find the family dead inside and no sign of John. John reappears in a new vehicle and continues to stalk the two. The rest of the movie continues to be a game of chase between John and the couple with a few deaths along the way.

Villain:

Sean Bean (Pictured Left) plays the film’s bad dude, John Ryder. In my opinion he stole the show. Bean was the only good thing that came out of The Hitcher, everyone else just sucked donkey balls. John was a cold hearted psychopath who stalked and terrorized his prey with no apparent motive behind his actions.

Unfortunately Bean could only do so much for his character. There happened to be a great deal of “suspension of disbelief” when it came to the abilities of Ryder. He single handedly took out most of the New Mexico state police force (and the smaller county sheriff’s department), but he struggled during a fight against Grace.

Ryder’s character was pretty bizarre as he did random things that had huge consequences to them and seemed to have to plan when it came to Grace and Jim. Ryder put himself in jeopardy many times (even allowed himself to get caught by the police) but passed on the opportunities to kill Grace and Jim many times. I thought the film makers did this just to prolong the movie and have many more “exciting” events. Whatever. Bean did the best he could for the character.

Cast:

The cast of The Hitcher was horrible. Well maybe not the actors and actresses themselves, but the characters in the film sucked. Headlining the way of crappiness were Grace and Jim. Grace (played by Sophia Bush) was nothing but a whiny little spoiled girl that brought very little to the table in the movie. I found it hard to remotely cheer or care for her character’s well being. Grace was a weakling in general. She had plenty of opportunities to take Ryder down, but failed to do so.

A crappy and annoying thing that Grace kept doing was exclaiming that, “I have a gun” every time she was in danger with Ryder lurking around. Oooh…I have a gun…really? If I’m a villain I think I would just stop and surrender right then and there because she has a gun. Note: that's sarcasm.

Woman, if you have a gun, you don’t threaten someone by saying you have a gun. The only way you should let them know is by pulling the f*ckin’ trigger and letting the gun speak for itself.

Jim was just a punk and a tool in the film. They could have inserted any dork into this role. Zachary Knighton (Pictured Left) played the role of Jim and did probably the best he could. Jim’s character didn’t ask for anything cool or special so Knighton didn’t really do anything cool or special in return. It’s probably not Knighton’s fault for playing such a paper thin character, but he didn’t really pony anything up to enhance the character either.

Neal McDonough plays the inept police officer in charge...well he strictly isn’t a cop, but he’s like a federal agent or something. His character comes across like New Mexico’s poor man version of a Texas Ranger. Under his command he loses close to a dozen officers to Ryder. Not all of them in the same incident either.

SFX/Gore:

When it was all said and done, The Hitcher had about twenty deaths in the film (also killed a bunny and mosquito). Most of them were random faceless and nameless police officers killed in cannon fodder moments. It was a Platinum Dunes movie, so there was a couple standard explosions in it (Michael Bay started the company).

My favorite kill in the movie was the splitting of the body. *** Spoiler: Highlight to Read *** Ryder captures Jim and chains his arms to one truck and his legs to another truck. Ryder drives one of the trucks forward and the forces pulls Jim’s body apart into two pieces. It was nice and brutal. *** End.

TNA:

The Hitcher was another installment of the Platinum Dune’s remakes that didn’t feature any of the good stuff. The movie was actually a “better watch” for the female audience than the male audience when it came to terms of eye candy. The females had at least three or so dudes to slobber over (Bean, Knighton, McDonough) throughout the film.

The male audience was lucky enough to score a major hottie in Sophia Bush (Pictured Below). Bush is a niece piece to look at…wow, that doesn’t sound a little perverted. Sophia scampers around the film in a skimpy outfit wearing a short skirt and a pair of brown F*ck Me Boots.

Bush and Knighton do share a tender moment in the shower at a random motel in the film. Don’t get too excited as nothing is really revealed and the scene is just a watered down love moment.

T.Gun’s Take:

The Hitcher is a classic example of a weak remake and a good argument for why movies shouldn’t be remade. Sure it had all the cool looking special effects that benefit from modern day technology, but the overall look for the film turned out to be…blah.

In my opinion there seemed to be a lack of suspense throughout the film as Ryder had several opportunities to dispense of the main characters, but chose not to. After a while I thought to myself that neither Grace nor Jim is in jeopardy or immediate danger until at least the hour and ten mark has gone by in the film. Boy…was I right. Everything done before that was just a waste of time and a bad way to build up tension.

All the characters in the film were generic and boring. Bean tried to kick some butt with his character, but could only do so much with what he had to work with. Everyone else in the film were stereotypical cut outs from past horror movies. None of the performances stood out from one another. Nobody was intriguing or interesting and I felt nothing for the characters at stake.

Outside of some generic characters, the script also had some pretty dumb scenes and forethought. First of all, Grace and Jim are idiots. Everything they do in the film is dumb and convenient for Ryder. It all starts off with them “ditching” Ryder in the middle of the road during a rain storm. They don’t even give a rat’s ass if he needs help or not. He looks creepy, so we should go.

Its’ funny how the Golden Rule of: “Do to others as you would have them do upon yourselves” goes by the wayside in their minds. The film does give a little dose of their own medicine back on them down the road.

I think their next dumb move comes after they drive the station wagon full of dead people to the diner. Instead of letting people there know what’s going on, they pretend that nothing’s wrong. I would be like, “There’s a dead family in this car! Call the police.” But that’s just too simple for The Hitcher’s plot. Keeping quiet eventually bites them in the butt as the cops find the bodies anyways.

Their next “Great” move comes when they decide to run from the police instead of letting the police help them. I hate how movies portray this in general. Let’s create paranoia and mistrust in the local law enforcement when it comes to a couple of dead bodies popping up.

Of course the “hands down” verdict in these situations is that the two of them did the murders and the hitchhiker is just part of their wild imagination. There’s no way that the police would investigate other options. Guilty, guilty, guilty! Well that’s the way Grace and Jim perceives their situation. So they flee from the police and go on the run like Bonnie and Clyde.

This leads to another “get the f*ck out of town” moment in the film. Grace and Jim are involved in a high speed chase with three other police cars and a helicopter following them. Our film’s bad guy comes driving up out of nowhere in his Smokey and the Bandit Trans Am and takes out all three cop cars and the helicopter.

Are you f*ckin’ kidding me? I know the killer’s good, but three cop cars and a f*ckin’ helicopter! Singlehandedly while driving a Trans Am! Wow. Talk about going a little bit too overboard when it comes to great chase sequences.

I could go over more and more dumb scenes/ideas from the film, but I’ll wrap it up with one last head banger, the great escape. Ryder gets caught by the police and pulls off the greatest escape from custody during his transport to a bigger city. He is shackled with leg irons, equipped with a bullet proof vest (I have no idea why), and handcuffed in the back of a county sheriff’s van when he pulls his best Houdini impersonation.

Ryder breaks his pinky fingers and slips out of the handcuffs. He proceeds to cut the guard’s throat with the teeth of the handcuff and then uses his gun to shoot the guards in the front of the van. Holy crap, this guy is the “sh*t” when it comes to slipping out of danger. He's like Chuck Norris! All these scenes are just examples of how lazy and dumb the writing is for the film.

Overall The Hitcher is a mindless horror movie remake that has a lot of fast paced sequences and the occasional brutal death for the viewing enjoyment. If you can put aside on how convenient everything in the film is set up, then you might like this film. For me, it blends in with other so-so horror movies. There aren’t any “one” scene that stands out in my mind to make this film different from any other attempts.

Misc. Movie Trivia:
-Film opened on January 19, 2007 and made $16.3 million at the Box Office ($7.8 million opening weekend)
-The car in the film is an Oldsmobile 442
-The London Bridge is actually in Lake Havasu City, AZ
-Director Dave Meyers, is known for directing music videos for Creed, Britney Spears, Jennifer Lopez, and The Dave Matthews Band