THE STORY: Jess is at the wheel. Nicole rides shotgun. And at the end of the road stretching before them is glittering, glamorous Hollywood. They’re on a road trip, all right…straight to hell. When the runaway lovers pause at an abandoned rest stop, Jess disappears. And someone else appears – someone with his own demented sense of fun. With drills. Staple guns. Box cutters. All the tearing, grinding, ripping tools you need to hew wood. Or metal. Or people. Especially young, pretty people just like Nicole. Raw fear rules in Rest Stop, the first film from Raw Feed, the newest brand name in horror, sci-fi and thrillers. Director John Shiban, writer and executive producer of The X-Files and Supernatural, keeps the terrors and twists coming, each out-shocking the last. Stop. Stay awhile. But don’t expect to rest.
THE REVIEW: Is everyone terrified of traveling across the country and getting lost in the middle of nowhere and dying? The seems to be the case because most of the current swath of horror movies is about that exact topic. It’s always interesting that Verizon doesn’t seem to have built a network in these out of the way places. The pay phone doesn’t work. No cars ever come through. It’s the highway equivalent of the Bermuda triangle.
Like many other flicks the heroine is running from the unknown—only knowing that if she doesn’t run she’s dead. And when someone does come to help—a cop—he finds it more important to help a cat out of a tree or some other lame script device. The cop, who is played poorly by Joseph “don’t call me Joey” Lawrence, apparently doesn’t believe a serial killer is much to worry about.
THE EXTRAS: The first extra is three alternate endings. Surprisingly each ending could have been used in the movie. They are all different which makes this the rare occasions where the alternatives are interesting enough to watch.
“Scotty’s Home Movies” – This featurette is a unique family album from one of the oddest characters in Rest Stop.
“On The Bus” – This featurette is a view of the activities that happen on the old yellow bus.
FRANKLY: Rest Stop is chaos full of blood. No matter how the filmmakers can cause death and destruction, they find a way to spill massive blood and gore. The rest of Rest Stop is complete stupidity. More often than not you’ll spend your time scratching your head and going “that is the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen” or “that’s impossible.”
+ Charlie Craine
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