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From HouseofHorrors.com Recent Reviews
The director of The Road Virus Heads North, Sergio Mimica-Gezzan, explains on the official website that he wanted the style of the piece to reflect police procedural shows. That would explain why The Road Virus Heads North doesn't look scary. Instead, it looks like (go figure) a stereotypical police procedural. I can understand handheld camera movement and filters when they create that gritty edge for something like Law and Order. But in here? Shoot me.
Literally. That's how I felt after twenty minutes. I wanted to turn off the television. The show was giving me a headache. I couldn't take much more. Generally, I can tell whether or not a movie is working for me. As soon as I check the time to see how much is left, that's when a movie loses me. For this one, it took two minutes.
Two minutes. That's death for an hourlong episode, and that's especially disappointing considering the source material. Out of the Everything's Eventual collection, Road Virus is the most terrifying. My first experience with it? I listened to the story on an audio CD after midnight. If you ever get the chance, I recommend you do the same. Sadly, this version's constant assault of shaky cameras and unmotivated pans and zooms and grainy filters and . . . oh, screw it.
Here's what I did like: the story plays up the significance of an earlier visit to a doctor. Richard Kinnell might have a terminal disease. He's also being chased by a supernatural painting called the road "Virus." Eh? Get it? Get it? Okay, it's not subtle, but, hey, it's something. I'm also giving points to Tom Berenger, who turns in a fine performance as the plagued writer. It made me wish the camera would just sit down and watch him talk. I mean, we're talking about Barnes from Platoon, for God's sakes.
By the by, Kinnell is actually a novelist. This makes him probably the 436th novelist to star in a Stephen King story. I guess it's a good thing that he's not writing stories about plumbers or patent attorneys, but how about branching out a little? It says something when his latest novel, Cell, switched up dramatically, and made the main character . . . a comic book writer.
The Fifth Quarter suffers from some of the same stylistic overkill of other episodes, but it benefits from a simple, realistic story. Okay, realistic isn't the right word, since it's about modern thieves who make a treasure map and split it into four quarters. In fact, that makes just about no sense when you stop and think about it. What are they, pirates? I hope not, because this summer's been pirate overload for me.
Jeremy Sisto is Willie, a convict who uses a day home from prison to relax with the family. Then a friend comes into the house with a bullet in his stomach. In one of those scenes where a character's life lasts only as long as they can provide us with valuable plot information, his friend makes mention of three cons who will piece their parts of a map together. Then he runs out of information and, therefore, dies. It's now up to Willie to confront the other members who betrayed his pal, take their map pieces, and find the location of a very tempting payload.
Sisto grounds the story, walking around with a gravelly voice and one of those fashionable two-day growths of beard that says, "I'll shave, but I'd better have a damn good reason". He keeps things straight and honest, and it's remarkable how adept he becomes in his dealings with tough guys named Jagger. Whether or not he gets his hands on the map, how he might, and whether or not that means anything in the long run (he's going back to jail the next day), I'll leave out.
Instead, I'll say that this episode gets interesting once the plot gets going. There's really nothing like holding people at gunpoint to ratchet up the tension. Considering that most of these people are cons and thugs on the search for millions of dollars, those guns were just more and more likely to go off. It doesn't hurt that I actually wanted Sisto to succeed and find the cash. In addition to nailing a solid archetype - the guy who will go straight after one last score - Sisto has a screen persona I respect. He was the highlight of Dead and Breakfast, and he held his own against Angela Bettis in May, which is a lot harder than it sounds.
There are shadings of infidelity and distrust in his family life, and I could've done without those. The story is at its best as we follow Willie around, surviving by the proverbial skin of his teeth. This story had the potential to reach the heights of Battleground. It doesn't, but it still works, and it's one of the better episodes of Nightmares and Dreamscapes.
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