Review of The Hitcher (1986) by Ola G — 23 Sep 2018

Jim Halsey (C. Thomas Howell), a young man delivering a car from Chicago to San Diego, spots a man hitchhiking in the West Texas desert and gives him a ride. The hitcher, John Ryder (Rutger Hauer), is brooding and evasive; when Jim passes a stranded car, however, Ryder forces his leg down on the accelerator. Ryder calmly states he murdered the driver and intends to do the same to Jim. Terrified, Jim asks what Ryder wants. He replies, "I want you to stop me." Ryder strokes Jim's face with a knife while telling him to say, "I want to die." When Jim realizes that Ryder never put on his seat belt and the car's passenger door is ajar, he shoves him out of the door. Relieved, Jim continues on his journey. When he sees Ryder in the back of a family car, Jim tries to warn them but becomes involved in an accident. He later comes across the family's blood-soaked car and vomits. At a nearby abandoned gas station, Ryder corners Jim but simply tosses him the keys he took from Jim's car. After Ryder leaves with a trucker, Jim encounters him again at another gas station, where the trucks nearly runs him down as it crashes into the pumps. As Jim flees, Ryder ignites the spilled gas and causes the station to explode. At a roadside diner, Jim meets Nash (Jennifer Jason Leigh), a waitress, and calls the police. As Jim relaxes, he finds a severed finger in his food and realizes Ryder is present...

Roger Ebert awarded it no stars and wrote, "But on its own terms, this movie is diseased and corrupt. I would have admired it more if it had found the courage to acknowledge the real relationship it was portraying between Howell and Rutger, but no: It prefers to disguise itself as a violent thriller, and on that level it is reprehensible". In her review for The New York Times, Janet Maslin wrote, "Mr. Harmon, making his feature debut, displays a much surer hand for action than for character, though even some of the action footage here looks meaninglessly overblown". In his review for The Washington Post, Paul Attanasio wrote, "The script (by Eric Red) is laconic in a dull way, much Cain but hardly able. And Harmon and his cinematographer, John Seale, have shot the movie in such brown murk, you can hardly make anything out. By the end, you're willing to forgive Ryder his worst if someone would just change the light bulb". In his review for The Globe and Mail, Jay Scott described the film as a "slasher movie about gay panic, a nasty piece of homophobic angst for the age of AIDS". A rare positive review came from Newsweek magazine's Jack Kroll who called it, "an odyssey of horror and suspense that's as tightly wound as a garrote and as beautifully designed as a guillotine". Leonard Maltin awarded the film a score of 2 1/2 out of a possible 4 stars (his most frequently used rating), criticizing the film's violence as being "genuinely grisly and unappealing" while also stating that the film wasn't without interest.

Robert Harmon´s "The Hitcher" is such an 80s classic horror/road movie in my book. This came out during the golden years for Rutger Hauer, when he was on top and delievered a couple of fantastic films in row. He gives us a chilling and magic performance in "The Hitcher"that you will never forget. He can portray a villain with layers and human feelings like no other actor. The storyline is nevertheless quite simple, and when re-seeing it today it does have a bit of a wobbly 80s structure and you can´t claim that C. Thomas Howell is a great actor. But, the film is still haunting and fantastic due to Rutger Hauer´s magnificent psychotic performance as John Ryder. Ryder wants to be stopped and he just awaits the final adversary that is able to kill him. The open ending and the unanswered question of why John Ryder does what he does is of my liking at least, as this adds to the vibe and feel of the film. It´s up to you to create that part on your own. "The Hitcher" is a true cult classic I liked the first time I saw it and I still like it.

Trivia: C. Thomas Howell admitted that he was actually afraid of Rutger Hauer on and off the set because of the actor's general intensity.

In Rutger Hauer's book "All Those Moments," Hauer discusses how producer Ed Feldman settled on Sam Elliott for the role of John Ryder. Hauer states that "Apparently, Elliott was so scary when he came in to audition that Edward S. Feldman was afraid to go out to his car afterward." Sam Elliott had a scheduling conflict and had to back out the role.

Rutger Hauer did a lot of the stunt driving throughout the movie which amazed the film crew and even the real stunt drivers.

This is one of the few films that Roger Ebert gave zero stars to. When he and Gene Siskel denounced the movie for its violence on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson (1962), Carson asked them if they were opposed to censorship, and Ebert replied, "Of course! The film should be made, it should be shown, and it should not be attended by anybody.".

The original script was long enough to make a three-hour film. Scenes that were never filmed include: Ryder slaughtering an entire family, an eyeball appearing in a hamburger (this was replaced in a finger in a plate of French fries), a graphic sex scene between 'Gal' Galveston (the girl before Nash) and Jim, and a character being decapitated. The film underwent several rewrites which removed the gorier moments.

In an appearance on Late Night with David Letterman, Rutger Hauer stated that the film originally ended with Jim Halsey shooting John Ryder as Ryder lay prone on the highway. However, to avoid an X rating, the filmmakers shot the ending that was ultimately used (with Ryder getting to his feet, showing he is still a threat, and giving Jim at least partial justification for shooting him).