Reviewed by Geno McGahee
A brother-sister combo on a road trip suddenly encounter a huge truck that begins trying to run them off the road, apparently. The movie begins with a “Night of the Living Dead” feel with the 1950s car and the long and winding roads, and the film immediately takes off. It’s one of the charms of this film. It catches you by surprise and puts you right into the action.
After they nearly get ran off of the road, they drive past an old church where a big man in an Indian Jones’ hat is throwing bodies down a pipe. As they drive by, they catch the notice of the evil Indiana Jones guy, and now he’s back in his truck and wants to really hurt them.
Darry (Justin Long) and his hot sister, Trish (Gina Philips) are now being hunted by what they believe to be a crazy guy, perhaps with an Indiana Jones fetish. The producers didn’t go that route though. There were no pictures of Harrison Ford hanging in the killer’s bedroom.
Darry and Trish pull a typical horror movie move and investigate the home of this killer. They walk over to the pipe where the bodies were being tossed, but they have to be sure. Darry actually climbs into the pipe, slips down and ends up in the basement of the church, where he sees all sorts of bodies, strung up on the walls. The duo get the heck out of there and catch up with the police to report it, but they are not dealing with your run of the miller serial killer. They are dealing with some sort of demon that can fly and that vehicle surfs like Michael J. Fox in Teenwolf.
One of the coolest scenes is when we see “The Creeper” standing on top of the police car that is following Darry and Trish as they drive. There are many neat scenes and we even have one person, who is considered crazy by the town, that knows the truth. You need one of those in every horror movie. Jezelle (Patricia Belcher), some tank ass that has some psychic ability saw the arrival of the duo and does what she can to warn them and prevent their deaths. She knows that “The Creeper” only wants one of the two, and now the question was: Which way does the Creeper swing?
The showdown at the end at the police station is pretty interesting and fun and when the team of heavily armed cops confront the Creeper, it’s pretty neat. In the end, we find out that the Creeper fancies men, claiming Darry as his own. Trish tries her hardest to save her brother’s innocence by saying “you want me,” but the Creeper knew what he wanted and flies away with Darry to his secret lair.
In the end, this movie is interesting and original. The characters are compelling, with the exception of that tank ass that knows everything…I really disliked her. This flick builds up the anxiety from the beginning with the Creeper’s road rage to the escape from the church, to the police station showdown. I really liked the look and the presentation of the villain, but if you are curious about his history, you will not discover anything. You don’t know what he is or why he is killing people when it is all over, and the ending when he is sort of dancing to the song “jeepers creepers,” you are left confused. Just some FYI for you: the sequel to this movie, which really blows, doesn’t inform you about his history either. I guess that we will just have surmise that he is a demon that kills because he is a demon and that is what demons do. And demons drive trucks and dance to jeepers creepers.
Scared Stiff Rating: 7/10. An original horror film, but seems to give an incomplete story.
