JOY RIDE

2001

I hate pranksters, and I hate adult males who act like 12-year-olds, and because the "heroes" of this movie are BOTH, you can understand why I was rooting for the bad guy. When you consider the fact that the bad guy happens to be a psychotic trucker who spends the entire film trying to kill these two simpleton brothers who played a bad prank on him, it tends to skew ones viewing of the movie! Having said that, let me encourage you to see the film, because even though most of it is predictable, and completely illogical at times, it'll still scare the hell out of you. Steve Zahn is very good as the newly-sprung, jailbird older brother, who always seems to look like a deer in the headlights. The generic actor who plays the younger brother is completely forgettable...and I have. For the first time, Leelee Sobieski does some truly bad acting. But none of this matters, because as in Stephen Spielberg's first film "Duel," the big, black tractor-trailer is really the star of the film, and it is a FINE villain!

3 Stars

NJB

Two brothers learn that it's not nice to play practical jokes on strangers when a psycho truck driver begins terrorizing them out in The-middle-of-nowhere, USA. Low expectations, despite the good buzz that has been going around, allowed me to enjoy this one much more than I would have thought. Despite the strong lack of reality it presents, this film is actually quite enjoyable. Mostly, this is because of Steve Zahn, without whom I believe this film might have gone straight to rental. He's really good... and he makes the movie fun. Paul Walker and Leelee Sobieski could've easily been replaced by any other teen actors and no one would notice anything different. Although this film is pretty decent in the action and suspense categories, I'd urge anyone who wanted to see a really freaky film about driving across country to watch THE HITCHER.

3 Stars

CDF