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Review:
 Okay,
a classic situation is something that has been done a thousand
times but is a good enough template to still be good when random
characters are plugged into it.
Okay: We’ve got a seedy motel somewhere in Nevada. There’s a
massive rainstorm and nobody can leave. There’s a killer loose and
the population decreases until there’s nobody left except the
killer, the hero and the heroine.
So we’ve got a jittery manager named Larry (John Hawkes) whom on
this dark and stormy night, starts out with an empty motel and
within minutes gets an eclectic band of guests: These include a
fading TV actress (Rebecca DeMornay) and her ex-cop limo driver
(John Cusack), who just ran over the mom (Leila Kenzle) who was
driving somewhere with her husband(John C. McGinley) and son(Bret
Loehr), the former of which was changing a tire that was punctured
by the spike heel of a shoe weirdly lost by a a prostitute (Amanda
Peet), whom Ed the chauffeur found when trying to find a way to a
hospital where Mom can be saved. When her car breaks down, they’re
picked up by a pair of bickering newlyweds (Clea DuVall and
William Lee Scott). Soon after they all get to the motel, we
finish the troupe with a psycho prisoner (Jake Busey) transported
by a nervous cop (Ray Liotta) -- from LAPD's notorious Rampart
Division. Could he be the guy on death row who’s being taken to
Carson City for an unusual midnight clemency hearing?
That’s what we’re supposed to think when the first person gets
it. The order is, as usual, from the most odious to the hero. It’s
not really a spoiler to say the first is the movie star. It’s the
"who gets it next?" game which is the fun part.
Red herrings swim by in huge schools and then they lay out the
maguffin and things get weird. The title of the film is totally
appropriate. You have to see this film. It is funny and scary and
completely out of left field. The ending is predictable, but only
when you get the maguffin, which I ain’t telling.
You’re going to have to find that out for yourself.
Eric Lurio
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