The Plot: Two couples find themselves at odds with a demonic road train on the desolate highways of the outback! Stranded and broken, they must try to back the evil truck down a road of risk eternal doom! Really. They spend the last half of the movie backing up... or attempting to. Add in a subplot about a guy with a whore girlfriend who sleeps with his best mate, and all of the tension it causes between the main characters, and you'll spend 85 minutes trying to back away from your TV.
First off, we really loved the concept of this movie; a driver-less truck that is most likely related to hell in some way, running not on fuel but on corpses, trying to fuel it's insatiable appetite... that's some fun stuff right there. It reminded me of Duel or The Hearse or something, with a bit of Joyride 2 thrown in for good measure, although the fairest comparison would be to say it is a lot like Road Games in feel and setting. (If you haven't seen Road Games, it's an oldie but goodie, and you should check it out.) Whichever one it reminds you most of, it's a "mysterious vehicle terrorizes innocent travelers for no apparent reason" flick in any case. Sometimes that concept works, sometimes it doesn't. Take a guess how it worked here.
The movie delivered some tense scenes, and managed to entertain well enough, some of the time, but something about it just never clicked into place as it should have. The acting was pretty good, the chicks were hot, there was some neat-o violence thrown in here and there... it had some merit. Where it lost its footing was in the sense department; not much of the movie made much sense, nothing was explained, and the characters were blisteringly stupid.
When a road train is bearing down on you at high speed, pull over. If you don't pull over, and it hits you, pull off the road when it does. If you let it hit and pass you, and then race to catch up to it, cut it off and flip the driver the middle finger, then you deserve whatever happens next. Why can no one ever be sensible in these movies? You're in a small suv and a guy in a massive, double-length semi truck hits you and nearly runs you off of the road, and you say "screw that guy, let's get him!" What the hell could you possibly do to him? That's nothing more than a dumb fucking person begging for tons of trouble. Call the cops. Pull over and let him drive off. Wish death on his family quietly to yourself... but try to fight a road train?
And let's discuss how after stealing a massive semi truck and fleeing from your life from a mad gunman, you not only manage to doze off while driving, but while you're sleeping you manage to turn off of the highway onto a dirt road, navigate your way down a narrow, winding incline, none the less and end up miles off course? While asleep! Wow. I guess you could write it off as "the truck willed it", and it drove itself somewhere, but they never explain it that way, and instead it comes off as a random happening. Again, wow.
Most of the movie after that is spent trying to back the truck up and get off of that road, although there's another place to turn around and escape that they eventually use... it's just really clumsy. Back up... stop, get out, wonder what's happening, get back in, back up 10 feet, stop, get out... fuck you.
And what's with the guy drinking his own piss after being out in the sun for hardly any time at all? What was she drinking from those cans? What was with all of the Cerebus imagery? Did anyone on the film crew realize that they got the direction they came from all screwed up? Why would you dump out 1 of your 3 bottles of water because you're all angry and throwing a tantrum?
It didn't suck as much as The Tomb did, but Roadkill was definitely a wreck none the less.
