Freeway

Rating:
Summary: Ah, Reese Witherspoon
Review: A biterly caustic satire on the slick explotative thrillers of the 1980's and 90's, "Freeway" features two brilliant performances: that of Reese Witherspoon, who went on to anchor the high school satire "Election," and Keifer Sutherland, in what is his creepiest role. And yet, the movie is also as funny as hell. It may take a while for you to slip into the gear of the movie, but once you do, you find yourself laughing at the oddest things (such as Michael Weiss' oddball performance as Witherspoon's stepfather). The DVD is a fine transfer, with a decent commentary track by director/writer Michael Bright (nothing to write home about - perhaps having one of the leads on the track would have provided some more insight).

Rating:
Summary: The Tough Girls Version of Red Riding Hood
Review: I will never be surprised by anything Reese Witherspoon ever does, because after accidentally coming across this film on cable, I have seen that the girl can play any role with ferocious energy and credibility. Not my kind of movie -- too gory and cynical -- but it was so astonishing and engrossing that I could not stop watching it all the way to the end. Reese, you go girl!

Rating:
Summary: Witherspoon has never been better
Review: This is director Matthew Bright's take on the old "red ridinghood" story. 15 year old Vanessa (Reese Witherspoon) is on her way to her grandmother, after her mother and sexually abusive stepfather has been send to jail. On her way, she runs into "The big bad wolf" in the form of Bob Wolverton (Kiefer Sutherland). This, at first, destinguised childpsychologist, helps her on her way...Only to try and rape and kill her, as he turns out to be the feared I-5 killer. Vanessa overpowers him, shoots him in the head and disfigures him. As she is "poor white trash" nobody believes her, and she is tried as an adult for attempted murder. She flees from jail, and heads towards her grandmothers place..Meanwhile, Bob is hellbend on killing her. This film is like nothing out of Hollywood I have seen in recent memory. An absolute must, to all those who think that american movies have lost its edge. Witherspoon has turned into a very succesful actress, but this is her finest hour. An aboslute powerhouse performance, she manages to be both innocent and immature, as well as volatile and antisocial. Had this movie been succesful, it ougth to have given her an oscarnomination. Highly recommendable. This movie has allready been released on DVD in my country Denmark, a couple of months ahead of the states. Buy it at any price.

Rating:
Summary: The BEST Christian movie EVER!
Review: You hear a lot of complaints these days about Hollywood ignoring the Christian market - but this little sleeper puts that misconception to bed.

The daughter of a drugged out street hooker Vanessa (Reese Witherspoon) struggles to improve herself in school. At home she fends off the sexual advances of her mother's drug addict boyfriend. After a disturbing scene with her boyfriend (I don't want to spoil it for you), Vanessa runs away to live with her grandmother.

When her car breaks down on the freeway, Bob (Donald Sutherland) stops to lend her a hand, and offers to drive her to her grandmother's house. Posing as a sympathetic ear this devious serial killer gets Vanessa to reveal her innermost secrets and concerns to him.

Just when Bob is about to kill Vanessa she turns the tables on him. After a long conversation she convinces Bob to accept Jesus Christ into his heart as his personal Savior. The scene is touching and reveals that Vanessa, though troubled, is dedicated to bringing the message of Jesus to others in any way she can. Cinematically, it's a great shot.

Unlike the characters in most Christian movies, Vanessa is complex, multi-dimensional, and a pleasure to watch - as you never know what she's going to do next.

Rating:
Summary: I don't remember THAT part of Little Red Riding Hood.
Review: Freeway is the story of Little Red Riding Hood. There's the major spoiler for you. That's it. Little Red Riding Hood. Now you know the entire story. See it anyway.

What Matthew Bright has done here is phenomenal. He has taken a story we've all known since we were children and he has recast it in a world full of gang violence, drug dealers, prostitutes and pedophiles. The juxtaposition is brilliant; an innocent children's story perverted by the harshness of a reality that most of us rather forget.

But the coach can only line you up, he can't make the play for you. For that, Bright has enlisted the phenomenal talents of Reese Witherspoon, Kiefer Sutherland, Amanda Plummer, Brooke Shields, Dan Hedaya (in my opinion one of Hollywood's most underrated actors), Michael T. Weiss, Brittany Murphy, Wolfgang Bodison and Bokeem Woodbine and Alanna Ubach. I wouldn't mention so many cast members, except that they were all so well cast that it would have been a crime to leave one of them out. Each character more or less represents an archetype, so it wasn't exactly possible for any of the actors to probe the depths and give us a vast emotional range, but that certainly wasn't for lack of trying. Despite the fact that ...I found myself able to relate to just about every character in the film. For 110 minutes, the world inside this film was real to me.

Like I said before, you know this story. There is nothing I can really do to spoil it for you, but its more than worth watching anyway. It isn't Oscar quality, but it isn't trying to be. What the film is trying to be is a a disturbing and yet interesting farce of s a social commentary on what the world has become. It delivers.

There isn't much that I can say that is bad about this film. All I can give is a warning to watch it in the correct frame of mind. It's offensive. Violence, sex, race and crime are all used to generate laughs. If this isn;t your cup of tea, then perhaps you should stay away. But if you can stomach black comedy, then this is one film you don't want to miss.

Rating:
Summary: A Wild and Hilarious Anti-Little Red Riding Hood
Review: "Freeway" is both gruesome and--to the right audience--hilarious. Reese Witherspoon gives a powerhouse performance as Vanessa Lutz, a sort-of sweet girl from the wrong side of the tracks, who, on a dime, can become a ruthless killer when necessity presents itself. Kiefer Sutherland is equally good, giving as greasy a performance as ever was of a smooth, unctuous predator. Witherspoon is Cassandra-like; sure, she tries to execute Sutherland, shooting him in the neck and face, and twice in the back...but no one listens to her when she tells them he's the serial killer they're all looking for. And she doesn't particularly care. Captured, accused, she lashes out at everyone. She is prosecuted, while Sutherland is presented in the media as a victim. Witherspoon taunts the now terribly-disfigured Sutherland hilariously in court--"Hey chipmunk-face!"--convincing everyone that she is an unpenitent sociopath.

Violence becomes Witherspoon's means of survival, and she isn't squeamish. In jail, she fashions a makeshift "knife" by melting plastic wrap around a toothbrush, melting it, and then sharpening the plastic. With this, she slashes a guard during an outing. The guard cries, "You didn't have to kill me!"

Vanessa snarls, "I didn't!" and off she goes.

If you can't stomach extreme violence, skip this one.

Rating:
Summary: Through the woods to grandmother's house we go
Review: There are any number of very sick jokes in this, not the least of which is the poor john is still in the trunk (ha!), and the sight of that girl with the...ah, legs from the sixth grade... Matthew Bright, you are one sick puppy! And the plot is at times a farcical burlesque of contrivance (Wolverton as the wolf in grandmother's bed; his resurrection). But no matter. Reese Witherspoon is very funny as Vanessa Lutz, a semi-literate teen who's got a whore for a mother and a lecherous junkie for a stepfather. By the way, Vanessa was faking that she couldn't read "The cat drinks the milk" in the opening scene just to make fun of the not entirely bright teacher. She's a home girl who can kick Major Buttski along with any celluloid hero, doing here a nice variation of a Bridget Fonda-like La Femme Nikita. She also has some admirable integrity and she's cute.

Kiefer Sutherland got way into his role as a child psychologist turned serial killer. The satanic leers and psychopathic drooling on his face as he contemplates his necromantic encounter with Witherspoon was enough to curdle sweet cream. Later when he gets the appliance to hold up half his mouth, displaying buck teeth, Witherspoon calls him a "chipmunk," but I thought he looked a little like Stephen Hawking after an injection of protoplasm. And Brooke Shields as his grieving, empty-headed wife was a scream. (And I did like that white skirt!) We are talking creative casting here!

Director Matthew Bright takes dead satirical aim at shrinks, prison guards, cops, social workers, judges, teachers, and any other societal cogs he can find and lets Vanessa, representing the under class, choke 'em, gouge 'em, cuff 'em, shot 'em, out smart 'em, and slap 'em across the face. One gets the impression that he was getting even with some people from his early years, which is good, since there's no revenge more satisfying than to trash your tormentors up there on the silver screen for all the world to see.

What I didn't like about this comedic romp through the barrios and the freeways and the institutions of SoCal Land was all that blood and nary a bit of skin. What IS it with you, Matthew Bright? You've got nubile Reese Witherspoon and a whole bunch of home girls, and Brooke Shields in that white dress, and you can't score some flesh tones? Are you some kind of prude?

Rating:
Summary: Simply Hilarious Satire
Review: I have a different sort of sense of humor than most people, so that may be the reason that I did not find this movie too violent or disturbing as some reviewers did here. They seem to be missing the point: this is SATIRE. The movie does not take itself seriously once, and that is what makes it so great. Everything is attacked here with acerbic wit, from tweaked out prostitutes to parole violations ("he most certainly does not have a gun, he's on parole, he hasn't owned a firearm in a long time") to welfare vouchers and wayward, illiterate teens to the foster care system and the media circus to serial killers and glue-sniffing jailhouse lesbians...this is a grab bag of American society at its rotten core and it works better than you expect it to.

Reese Witherspoon plays Vanessa Lutz with glee. You can just tell she has a ball with her character, and the lines she gets to utter are priceless. This is a movie where the dialogue will stick in your head long after the end credits roll. Keifer Sutherland also seems to enjoy playing the "Bad Wolf" I-5 killer Bob Wolverton, almost disturbingly so. The violence in this movie is not as explicit as many reviewers have stated. Freeway comes across more as a twisted comedy than a thriller, although there are some brief instances of violence.

The action flies by quickly and by the end, we don't want the ride to conclude. Freeway succeeds in all parts.

Rating:
Summary: Absolutely HORRIBLE
Review: Thank God for the opening credits sequence, which blatantly clues us in that this nihilistic, awful, stupid, painfully unfunny black comedy is a modern-day take on the "Little Red Riding Hood" story. Otherwise it'd just be another one of those movies about sarcastic teens on a road trip to nowhere. Wait a second, that's what THIS is.

I wonder why I'm so resistant toward Reese Witherspoon. I think it's probably because in every movie I've seen her in, she's forced to talk with a strained accent that makes fingernails on a chalkboard sound like a Beethoven symphony. She's forced to act like such a resilient baby here I was hoping someone would stuff a sock in her mouth. Kiefer Sutherland, on the other hand, fares really well as the child-molester-psychologist who picks her up (the "big bad wolf"), and it's unfortunate that his scenes are limited. As for the supporting cast, I hated just about every apathetic, violent, and stupid character that walked by.

It seems like everyone who likes this movie is on the serious "indie trip" where they can't discern art from plain down garbage, and think it's 'cool' to support this stuff, because it's the "in" thing. Oliver Stone, who executive-produced this crap, fared better with "Natural Born Killers." Even "The Doom Generation" is superior to "Freeway."

Rating:
Summary: See this film and get a slap in the face
Review: Why is "Freeway" one of the better films of the '90s? Here are ONLY A FEW of the questions raised and terrains navigated successfully by this hilarious, great little 'dark' film(its atrocious sequel "Freeway 2," written and directed by the same guy (Mathew Bright), provides the ULTIMATE PROOF just how thin the line between Greatness and Utter Manure is, and how difficult it is to balance on that line):

Are speed taking Prostitutes not good mothers? Well, obviously, they are not. But, and this is a big but, this does not necessarily constitute a situation where there is no love between mother and child. Damaged child? Well, to a certain extent, of course, yes. But this does not rule out the possibility that this damage can be transcended by a strong child such as Reese Witherspoon's utterly convincing Vanessa. This situation is the stuff of American legend and heroism. Huckleberry Finn is the classic example of the damaged but still transcendently pure American soul overcoming a disastrous background. This is the soul that made the kid in "Sling Blade" so overwhelmingly sympathetic. That soul is something precious--once it is lost it can never be regained. Huckleberry Finn kept it by running away. The kid in Sling Blade was doomed because he was tied to his situation by his love for his mother. Consequently Billy Bob solved his problem for him by sacrificing himself and getting rid of Dwight Yokam. Overcoming adversity and so-called damaged backgrounds is the very essence of a certain authentic American heroism. Call it the 'heroism of modern life' if you want but there's no such thing as an anti-hero; that's as meaningless a term as 'amoral,'

There's a certain inherent integrity in youth that under certain hardships, pressures and trials can flower into a beautiful strength. These kids instinctively arrive at a deeply ironic understanding of things 'sophisticated' people may take years to develop. That mysterious 'strength' is the essence of Reese Witherspoon's characterization of Vanessa Lutz. Vanessa is the living embodiment of writer/director Mathew Bright's cultivated irony in raw form. Elizabeth Berkeley's unfairly criticized performance in Verhoeven's "Showgirls" not only operates within similar "over the top" territory but demonstrates similar qualities of youthful 'heroism,' and necessary ruthlessness. "Showgirls" can be seen as the further misadventures of Vannesa, a few years down the road, if she hadn't met up with Kiefer Sutherland's serial killer.

"Freeway" goes one better than breaking cliches, it shows and exposes through "over the top" characters rooted firmly in reality certain very fleeting characteristics vaguely noted and stored by most people. Artists, who have cultivated powers of observation, are more familiar with these fleeting characteristics on a conscious level; they can detect and observe them more freely in the regular, quite absurd but so-called "not over-the-top," "everyday" reality that we all live in. In other words, in 'over-the-top' characters, those traces of absurdity you constantly discern on a low volume level are turned way-up-high for easy exposure and satirical comment. This is particularly necessary for short-attention-spanned American audiences. Great directors may use ultra-subtle methods to achieve the same results, but that requires cultured audiences able to perceive that subtlety. That subtlety usually flies right over the heads of Americans. A great, subtle foreign film with dark satirical elements like Bruno Dumont's "Life of Jesus" or "L'Humanite" will open, bore most Americans to death, and close in a week. So, in order to sell some tickets and say anything significant at all, 'over-the-top' performances and a so-called 'black'comedy format often become necessary. Masterpieces in this type of film though sometimes instantly recognized (Dr.Strangelove), are quite often misinterpreted, underrated, and later rediscovered (Sam Fuller's "Shock Corridor" and "Naked Kiss," Russ Meyer's "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls," Ken Russell's "Crimes of Passion" and "The Devils," Paul Verhoeven's "Spetters" and "Showgirls," etc.)

Bright's film shows no pity for vicious criminals and sanctimonious citizens alike. Bright mocks all liberal tendencies of showing "compassion" for vicious killers and also, of course, conservative tendencies of passing judgment on a so-called 'vicious' killer too quickly.

After everything she's gone through Vanessa still manages to smile triumphantly as she asks for a cigarette. The two detectives showing smiling admiration for her further solidifies her status as an exceptional person and 'hero.' The last shot freeze-frames on her slightly crazy looking yet still non-cynical and non-bitter smile.