Rest Stop (2006) (V)

Director:

John Shiban

Writer:

John Shiban (written by)

Release Date:

23 July 2007 (Greece)

Genre:

Horror | Thriller

Plot:

The film follows Nicole Carrow, a young woman who is threatened by a maniac serial killer, after her boyfriend Jess, is abducted in a rest stop.

Plot Keywords:

Serial Killer | Restroom | Truck Stop | Highway Rest Stop

Cast

Jaimie Alexander	...	Nicole Carrow
Joey Mendicino	...	Jess Hilts
Deanna Russo	...	Tracy Kress
Diane Salinger	...	The Mother (as Diane Louise Salinger)
Michael Childers	...	The Father
Curtis Taylor	...	The Ranger
Joseph Lawrence	...	Officer Michael Deacon
Gary Entin	...	Twin #1
Edmund Entin	...	Twin #2
Jennifer Cormack	...	College Student
Mikey Post	...	Scotty

Also Known As:

Rest Stop: Dead Ahead (Australia) (DVD title)

MPAA:

Rated R for strong violence and gore, language and some sexuality.

Runtime:

80 min | 85 min (unrated version)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Certification:

New Zealand:R16 | Singapore:R21 | Germany:18 (JK/SPIO) (cut) | Canada:16+ (Quebec) | Australia:MA | USA:R | Portugal:M/16

Filming Locations:

Santa Clarita, California, USA

Company:

Flame Ventures

Goofs:

Continuity: Nicole cuts her arms several times through the movie, yet when you see the insides of her arms in other scenes, most of the time she doesn't have a scratch on her and other times she has a really horrible gash in a place where she wasn't cut before.

Movie Connections:

References Superman (1941)

Soundtrack:

All That Remains

What happened to the plot? They flushed it down the potty!

Young couple on the road, minding their own business and having casual sex in their car during broad daylight. Yet, suddenly, they're being menaced and terrorized by a deranged psychopath in an old and rusty pick-up truck. Hmm, where have I seen this premise before? Oh yeah, now I remember, we've seen this a THOUSAND times before already, and approximately nine hundred and ninety-nine of the other cases were much better than "Rest Stop"! This weak and pitiable new movie is insulting even to the intellect of the most undemanding horror fans, as it doesn't feature a single original twist or memorable gimmick. It's very sadistic and nasty, but every teenkill-slasher flick is sadistic and nasty nowadays, so that's no real surprise anymore, neither. The absolute main problem with this production is the incredibly large amount of dumb plot holes and meaningless sub plots. Writer/director John Shiban damn well realized that the ultra-thin basic storyline nearly wasn't enough to fill a whole movie with, and thus he stuffs up his film like a Thanksgiving turkey with imbecile and nonsensical padding material. Nicole's boyfriend vanishes at an abandoned and filthy rest stop in California. Killing off her character right away wouldn't result in a very long movie and thus she subsequently encounters a motor home family of freaks, suffers from visions (?) in which she talks to the deranged killer's previous victims and she has deeply emotional (and boring) conversations with a police officer who just won't die even though a truck ran over him...twice! The dumb sub plots never lead anywhere and they're definitely the most pathetic and desperate attempts to stretch a movie's length I've ever seen. Instead of all the pointless padding, Shiban should have paid more attention to building up tension and make his lead characters a little more likable. Jaimie Alexander's character Nicole is an annoying and brainless girl, and you won't really care whether she'll survive the ordeal or not. Her boyfriend Jesse as well as the cop are both whining losers and their brutal deaths still weren't painful enough, if you ask me. I counted exactly three sequences, all including torture and gratuitous mutilation, that were gory and exciting enough to bring a sadist smile on my face. That's still way too few for a nowadays horror movie. Basically, "Rest Stop" is simply a miserable attempt to cash in on the success of such films like "Wolf Creek" and "Hostel", but you're better off watching the originals. This was the first film of the new production company called 'Raw Feed'. They're promoting themselves as the new name in great horror, but they'll have to come up with something much better than "Rest Stop" if they want us to believe that.