Robert Harmon’s 1986 movie The Hitcher was no canonical classic, but it always made for serviceable video viewing after a lengthy stint in the pub. Major studio horror remake #52,877,568 comes courtesy of Michael Bay’s Platinum Dunes, the same vultures behind recent retoolings of The Amityville Horror and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.
Unlike those vaguely acceptable exercises, this latest chunk of carrion is distinguished only by rank uselessness.
Out goes the freaky quasi-mysticism and fudged sexuality of Mr. Harmon’s film in favour of product placement and kaboom-ery. Roles once occupied by Jennifer Jason Leigh and C. Thomas Howell are now (barely) filled by Some Pretty Girl (Bush) and Some Ripped Boy (Knighton). Sean Bean, in the least restrained performance of his career, stands in for Rutger Hauer as the titular menace. Once he flags down the bland nubile leads, he, like, totally ruins their spring break with violent threats and an increasingly implausible murder spree.
By the final act all attempts to invest the material with sense have floundered. The tension that allowed you to believe in the all-American grandstanding of something like Duel is entirely absent. Without it, Bean’s antagonist is doomed to comic book super villainy. As he takes out dozens of cops, cars and, oh yes, a helicopter, you keep wondering when the Justice League will arrive.
Sobbing through her industrial strength waterproof mascara, Final Girl Lite asks Mr. Bean why he’s doing this. ‘Why not?’ comes the lazy response. Well, if the screenwriters couldn’t be bothered to think about it, then why should you?