Halloween is coming up and if you're in the mood for an old fashioned,
Grade B thriller, "Joy Ride" may be right up your alley. The production
makes some mistakes, but manages to establish and maintain a palpable
sense of menace by tapping into areas of primal fear. You know that
vague discomfort you feel while driving in the middle of nowhere late at
night? "Joy Ride" plops you into that setting, then ups the fear factor
by adding an anonymous figure, one that cannot be reasoned with, whose
only goal is to get his hands on you.
Here's the set-up. Lewis (Paul Walker) is a college student who dreams
of turning his relationship with Venna (Leelee Sobieski) from platonic
to romantic. To that end, he agrees to pick her up from her school in a
different city, looking forward to a road trip with the girl of his
dreams. Just as he is leaving, he learns that his older brother, Fuller
(Steve Zahn), is in jail. Despite being leery over his seemingly
incorrigible sibling, Lewis heads to the pokey and picks him up.
While on the road to Venna-land, Fuller buys a cheap used CB radio,
installs it in the car and starts fiddling with the old machine ("This
is like a prehistoric Internet!" he chirps happily). Before long, he
gets Lewis to join in the fun, adopting a female voice and using the
name Candy Kane to stir up nearby truckers. In short order, a
gravel-voiced driver using the handle Rusty Nail starts chatting with
Ms. Kane.
The boys carry the prank further, luring Rusty Nail to a local motel for
a rendezvous with the fictitious young lovely, while they press their
ears to the wall of a neighboring room to listen to the reaction. But
the practical joke explodes and the boys find themselves pursued across
the dark rural highways by a killer bent on vengeance. When they pick up
Venna, things get even worse - Rusty Nail decides that, in lieu of Candy
Kane, Venna will do.
The actors make fine surrogates for the viewer. Paul Walker is the
bland, easily influenced everyman, Leelee Sobieski stays suitably
wide-eyed as a bright kid thrust into an insane situation and Steve Zahn
adds texture as the comic relief who watches in horror as his little
joke turns lethal.
Rusty Nail is a great villain. We've all heard voices like his calling
right-wing chat shows late at night, talking conspiracies and
Armageddon. Wisely, the filmmakers never show us his face. Foolishly,
they do show the gruesome results of his attacks - in general, a
description of something horrible is far more chilling than a picture.
Despite an over-reliance on stunt driving late in the proceedings, "Joy
Ride" works because we know that there really are crazy people out
there, and that on any given night we could become the target of one of
them.
Copyright © 2001 Edward Johnson-Ott
