The original 2001 Joy Ride written by J.J. Abrams was one of “my movies.” I must have had it constantly rotating in my DVD player for months and months. I was psyched when the direct-to-DVD sequel, Joy Ride: Dead Ahead, was released in 2008; but honestly it left a lot to be desired. When Joy Ride 3: Roadkill was announced, I kind of rolled my eyes at it until I heard that Declan O’Brien was directing it. He has written/directed some great DVD titles including Sharktopus and Wrong Turn 4. Declan sitting in as traffic controller took away a little of my hesitation, so with that in mind I purchased Joy Ride 3: Roadkill on Amazon Instant Video last night. Here’s my review.
Joy Ride 3: Roadkill is written and directed by Declan O’Brien (obviously). Cast members include Jesse Hutch (Freddy vs. Jason, “Arrow”), Ben Hollingsworth (“Cult,” “The Tomorrow People”), Gianpaolo Venuta (“Being Human”), Jake Manley (“Hemlock Grove”), Kirsten Prout (Elektra, Twilight: Eclipse), Leela Savasta (Black Christmas, “Battlestar Galactica”), James Durham (The Haunting in Connecticut), Dean Armstrong (“Queer as Folk,” Saw 3D), and Ken Zirzinger as Rusty Nail.
Joy Ride 3 starts off with a long-ish opening kill scene featuring two junkies. I wasn’t thrilled for two reasons: 1) I hate drug addicts and 2) it established Rusty Nail as an actual person, an actual serial killer. By the time this movie takes place in 2014, 13 years after the original, Rusty Nail – or more-so his strip of highway – is a bit of an urban legend. People are well aware that he makes a habit of killing people, and what’s worse is the movie shows him doing so frequently. What was so cool about Joy Ride and parts of Joy Ride 2 was that Rusty Nail was this omniscient force of death that you never see, but you know he’s lurking and waiting to attack. Very much like Michael Myers in Halloween, but a lot less iconic, obviously. By showing Rusty Nail full bodied and walking around every ten minutes, it really subtracted from his creep factor. Made him look more like a sexually frustrated trucker than a scary truck smashing serial killer.
The plot of Joy Ride 3 was bound to happen sooner or later, especially in this franchise. This concept delighted me greatly because I love fast cars. You can’t go wrong with muscle cars or race cars, and it’s even better when they let an attractive woman (Leela Savasta) drive it for a second. There’s a line in Red 2 with Bruce Willis, “There’s nothing more breath taking than a beautiful woman with a powerful gun.” Well, there’s nothing more breath taking to me than a beautiful woman driving a faster than life race car! The fact that the team was going to a big race in Canada made me believe the movie was going to have a much faster paced, explosive ending than it did. In my head, I pictured Rusty Nail plowing his way through the stands of a Nascar-esque track while trying to get to our lead characters. Instead, Joy Ride 3 goes for a lower key finale that features a few more torture scenes, twists and turns, and fun bloody action.
And, I do have to say, all of the cast members did a terrific job here. The fact that all of them have a lot of horror/scifi credits to their name only adds to my support of their work in this title.
I really enjoyed all the camera work, special effects, and all the other jobs that went towards making this feature film, but Joy Ride 3 was just missing something. I don’t think it lives up to the original, but that’s to be expected. Most sequels in a franchise never live up to the feel, tone, and quality of the first film. It just doesn’t happen. All you can hope for as a director, producer, distributor, etc is that you do a good enough job with your team, continue on a popular character, and hope fans will follow the franchise. I think that was definitely accomplished here, and I think that I’d rate Joy Ride 3: Roadkill a few notches above Joy Ride 2: Dead Ahead.
Again, my only real complaint here is the personalization, characterization of Rusty Nail.
I’m going to rate this one a 7.5 out of 10!
