Road Train is a 2009 – released May 2010 – Australian horror film, released as Road Kill in the U.S., directed by Dean Francis and written by Clive Hopkins. The movie stars Xavier Samuel, Bob Morley, Georgina Haig and Sophie Lowe.
Plot:
Driving through the Australian outback, best friends Marcus (Xavier Samuel) and Craig (Bob Morley) and their girlfriends, Nina (Sophie Lowe) and Liz (Georgina Haig) are confronted by a road train. The monstrous vehicle comes up behind their Jeep and pushes them off the road. Craig’s arm is broken and their vehicle is a wreck.
The traumatised couples’ reluctantly seek help from the driver of the truck, which has stopped some distance up the road. The driver is nowhere to be found. Distant gunshots are heard, and a crazed figure in the bush screams and runs towards them. In terror, the friends commandeer the truck. Driving through the outback, the truck’s radio comes on by itself and lulls the four to sleep, leaving the huge vehicle to drive itself off the road and up a hill. Liz goes off in search of a shack she claims to have seen, while Marcus attempts to turn the truck around.
Nina discovers the truck’s fuel tanks are empty but finds a large pipe hanging underneath the trailer, filled with a mysterious red goo. Craig, tormented by visions of three-headed Hell hound Cerberus snarling and barking, finds a key to the trailers and investigates the rearmost. The trailer’s door closes itself ominously behind him and he is heard to scream…
Reviews:
“It’s not a perfect film – there’s a lot of incongruous dialogue and infuriatingly daft decisions on the part of the characters – but Road Kill (damn I hate that U.S. friendly title) is fresh and original enough to deserve a watch.” Horrorview
“Beyond some surface positives (decent acting, effective car accidents), there’s just not a heck of a lot to enjoy here. It’s not scary and its attempts at psychological horror fall entirely flat. But you really can’t holster any one aspect of Road Kill with blame. Nothing about it plays, and it it’s hard to imagine being anything other than annoyed while slogging through these dire proceedings.” Dread Central
“Francis positively relishes taking his viewers on deranged, demonic detours down uncharted byroads of body horror, too, with grand Guignol as icky as it is utterly irrational… The film’s epic brand of intimacy is mirrored by some breathtaking cinematographic vistas.” Eye for Film
“Ponderously repetitive, this low mileage horror runs out of gas really fast. There’s minimal gore and absolutely zero characterization…” Cool @ss Cinema
“Good moments: the opening sex scene, one guy getting his head squashed under one of 30 truck tires, a wood chipper type machine in the back designed for processing bodies into fuel. Not good moments: long stretches of none of the above happening.” Drinkin’ & Drive-In
“The main issue with the film is that after a promising set-up, the story has them drive the road train onto an off-road and then abandons the group in the middle of nowhere off and just peters out. The characters are split up and the film feels lax about following what happens to them…” Moria
Trailer:
