Movie Info
Movie Name: Wrong Turn
Studio: Summit Entertainment/Constantin Film/Media Cooperation One
Genre(s): Horror
Release Date(s): May 30, 2003
MPAA Rating: R
Worst game of hide-and-seek
Chris Flynn (Desmond Harrington) is trying to get to an important interview, but a traffic jam has snarled his way…leading to an unplanned detour that could save him a ton of time or cost him his life. An accident strands Desmond with a group of campers named Jessie Burlingame (Eliza Dushku), Carly Numan (Emmanuelle Chriqui), Scott Korbee (Jeremy Sisto), Evan Ross (Kevin Zegers), and Francine Childes (Lindy Booth) on a desolate and untraveled road. Now, the group is being hunted by people who likes to kill, and hunting men is one of the best hunts they can have.
Directed by Rob Schmidt, Wrong Turn is a horror thriller. The film was met with a strong box office but mixed to negative reviews.
Pardon me…I feel we are being misrepresented as “inbred mountain men”…I studied at Yale!!!
I like horror movies, but nothing about Wrong Turn ever appealed to me. Hillbilly horror is almost its own genre stretching from dramas like Deliverance to something almost like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre that has a similar vibe…Wrong Turn is a so-so take on the genre that goes heavy on gore and horror.
The movie is less frustrating than some of the “lost in the woods” horror movies. While a majority of the cast is kind of irritating (like Emmanuelle Chriqui who play the “we’re all gonna die” character) and they sometimes yell when they should be quiet, they do the right thing on occasion. They realize getting away is the biggest concern and for the most part, they try…but they are outsmarted by the backwoods men most of the time.
While there is an ensemble cast, it quickly comes down to Eliza Dushku and Desmond Harrington versus the rednecks. Jeremy Sisto, Kevin Zegers, Lindy Booth, and the annoying Emmanuelle Chriqui aren’t factors and that is obvious from early on in the film. The monster men are halfway interesting at points, but they are never explained or expanded upon (like the characters of Texas Chain Saw Massacre) aren’t distinguished or explained in the scripts. I wish there had been a bit more of a Hills Have Eyes family vibe to the creatures.
You’re going to taste yum yum yummy in my tum tum tummy!
The mountain men are essentially monsters. Famed horror director Stan Winston designed the creatures and they are creepy (I particularly like the wiry little guy). The movie is mixed with a lot of gore and horror…it does feel a bit like an ’80s slasher in that sense.
Wrong Turn isn’t very distinctive or very good. It was a straight horror movie in a time when a lot of movies were following the Scream formula of being horror comedies or they were PG-13. The movie started a franchise. Wrong Turn was followed by Wrong Turn 2: Dead End in 2007.
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