Do people never learn? You're not supposed to talk to strangers! (The Hitcher [2007] (DVD))

Member Name: Great_reviewer07

Product:	The Hitcher [2007] (DVD)
Date:	22/04/09 (158 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Sean Bean is menacing, good story and it's genuinely scary at times

Disadvantages: A very typical teen horror

The Hitcher is a 2007 horror film remake starring Sean Bean it's rated 18 as it's very violent and it runs for approximately 84 minutes. Despite my love of this film it actually only grossed an extremely disappointing $23,153,663 at the box office and only 20% of the reviews of this film were actually positive... not a great start is it?! Infact this film is apparently so bad that it's actually been voted number 12 of the worst remakes of all time!

The Hitcher is directed by Dave Meyers who's a notorious music video director. He's worked with artists such as: Kelly Clarkson, Jay Z, Aaliyah, Pink, Missy Elliot and of course good old Britney Spears! Michael Bay is part of the production team on this, I knew his name rang a bell but it didn't click until I looked it up... Transformers! Of course he's played his part behind the scenes in the making of Bad Boys, Pearl Harbour and The Rock to name but a few, with a producer of his stature this film should be brilliant.

Sean Bean is the main star of the film, he's also starred in: Flight Plan, National Treasure and Golden Eye. His co-stars are Sophia Bush and Zachary Knighton. For anyone that watches One Tree Hill you're bound to know who Sophie Bush is, she's also famous for formally being married to her gorgeous One Tree Hill co-star Chad Michael Murray. Zachary Knighton, the lesser known of the three is only really famous for a couple of short lived American TV shows which I've never even heard of and I doubt you will have either!

The Hitcher follows happy young couple Jim Halsey (Zachary Knighton) and Grace Andrews (Sophie Bush) as they're on their long journey to see Grace's friends. It's going to be the first time they meet Jim and he's nervous as he desperately wants to make a good impression. During the night Jim starts to get tired and the weather is reigning in on them, Jim and Grace are busy messing about while driving and Jim has to swerve suddenly to miss a man in the middle of the road. Jim wants to see if he's ok but the man just stands there as if noting happened, Grace is weary and asks Jim to keep driving she says they'll stop at a gas station and tell them to send some help.

When they arrive at the gas station they bump into an English man (Sean Bean) who just so happens to be the man they swerved to avoid earlier that night, he introduces himself as Ryder and apologises for scaring them, he asks where they're heading an big coincidence he's heading the same way! Jim agrees to give him a lift, reluctantly. While in the car they realise that Ryder isn't exactly the nice guy that he had first made out he was and pretty soon Jim and Grace realise that if they are to get out of this situation alive they're going to have to escape Ryder first...

This is a film that I first saw on Sky Movies, it was one of those films they show at about 1 in the morning to simply fill up some time so frankly I wasn't expecting much from this. Upon reading the synopsis an alarm went off in my head and those dreaded words came into my head 'TYPICAL TEEN HORROR' there seem to be so many about and 3 quarters of them are absolutely terrible. Luckily this was an exception to the rule.

The film starts off by introducing us to the two main characters Jim and Grace, Jim goes to pick Grace up from college and immediately I had a misconception in my head. I've seen so many teen horrors start off this way and they all turn out to be awful so why was this going to be any different?

Well my first thought was because this starred Sean Bean, don't get me wrong I haven't actually seen him in much but I know he's a big star and normally with these teen horrors you get relatively unknown names so I decided I'd give it a chance and see how it pans out, after half an hour if I didn't like it I could simply switch it off. The second thing that made me think twice about this film was Michael Bay, I've seen a lot of films that he's been involved with and they were all fantastic, infact Armageddon and Pearl Harbour are two of my favourite films so I was genuinely hoping that this could match up to those.

After about 15 minutes of setting the scene the film really kicks in, it gets into one of those very clichéd and sometimes irritating moments when the weather's bad, the two characters are messing about and having a laugh, everything seems fine and then boom something sinister happens. I've seen it so many times and to be honest it's laughable and although they try it really isn't frightening after you've seen the same thing a million times.

Nevertheless, despite the very characteristic and clichéd setting that has become the norm in teen horror films these days it actually manages to grasp and sensationally hold your attention. This is the type of film that you could practically watch in your head as it's so predictable, having said that this isn't a thriller, it wasn't made to be unpredictable it was made to scare you and I'm happy and actually a bit embarrassed to admit that it did!

Sean Bean was solely the reason for this, his portrayal was brilliant, he manages to be menacing but somehow quite sexy in a sinister way all the way through and he's a genuinely frightening character. Thy say that the scariest murders are the ones with no motive and this rings extremely true to that saying. Ryder simply likes to hurt people for the sheer hell of it and he wont be stop until his last breath. His ferocity at how he follows the bewildered couple for so long is indisputably startling and you'll find yourself tensing up more and more as the film goes along.

I truly believe that when a film becomes so typical, predictable and has so many clichés thrown in then it's bound to be brilliant as it just becomes impossible to ignore. This film is a prime example of that, The Hitcher really goes to the extreme norm of horror films yet it has that special something that enables it to stand out amongst the rest of them and for that reason and that reason only I think this film deserves a chance.

The ending is good and wraps things up nicely, it of course is filled with it's own clichés and if you've seen it you'll understand what I mean. I've heard there's a sequel to this which to be honest I'm not that interesting in seeing as I think they've taken this franchise as far as they can. I haven't seen the original 80's film but my Dad has and he told me that it's far superior to this film, having said that he did thoroughly enjoy this and seeing as though we have very similar tastes in films if I see the original showing on TV then I'm very likely to watch it just so I can make my own comparison between this and the original.

I'd highly recommend this to any fan of the teen horror genre as this is far superior to a lot of them and really manages to stand out from the crowd. I wouldn't put this on a pedestal with the likes of the Final Destination franchise but I think it's a brilliant film and there's times when you'll be genuinely scared. This film will no doubt put you off ever picking up a hitchhiker believe me!

After seeing this on Sky Movies I liked it so much that I actually bought in on DVD a couple of months later, when I bought it I think it cost me around the £8 mark from play.com and these days you'll find it on offer for £5.99 which is a great price for such a brilliant film.

The special features included are:
Over 20 minutes of deleted scenes
Behind the scenes
The making of the Hitcher

The soundtrack includes:
"Closer" - Nine Inch Nails
"Move Along" - The All American Rejects
"Out Of My Hands" - The Dave Matthews Band
"How We Operate" - Gomez
"Fallin' in Love Again" - Hamilton, Joe Frank and Reynolds
"Building Up to Feel So Good" - The Velcro Pygmies
"On and On" - Stephen Bishop
"From Here You Can Almost See the Sea" - David Gray
"Don't Give Up On Us" - David Soul
"Remember" - Al Parsons
"The Cowboy" - Eric Speier

There's a couple of big names in the line up such as All American Rejects and David Gray however I wouldn't recommend buying it, if you like a couple of the songs then simply download them.

Summary: The reason why I should hate this film is actually part of the reason why I love it!