Wuchak RELEASED TO VIDEO IN 2008 and directed by Louis Morneau, "Joy Ride 2: Dead Ahead" chronicles events on the desert highways out West when 4 youths on their way to Las Vegas breakdown and come across Rusty Nail, the diabolical trucker from 2001's "Joy Ride." One of the reasons "Duel" (1971) is so memorable is because it was believable. Something like it COULD happen. "Joy Ride" was cut from the same cloth, but added the youth element and the slasher angle. It was engaging enough, but ruined by mounting improbabilities, particularly in the last act."Joy Ride 2" is better, with a few notable scenes, but it's also marred by cartoony horror implausibilities. The prologue, for instance, made me bust out laughing (you'll know what I mean). Still, the movie successfully makes a mysterious trucker and his ominous truck a formidable horror icon.Nicki Aycox arises as the female protagonist with mettle while statuesque Laura Jordan plays her sister. Both are serviceable in the female department. Nick Zano is solid as the male protagonist, but his role is limited. Meanwhile Kyle Schmid is extremely obnoxious as the arrogant goth punk or whatever. Rusty Nail gives him a nice slice of humble pie.THE MOVIE RUNS 91 minutes and was shot in British Columbia, Canada (the Thompson-Nicola Region, east of the Cascades). WRITERS: James Robert Johnston & Bennett Yellin.GRADE: B-

gerardolandini Shoddy and tasteless. To all those people who are rightly curious to watch the sequel of "Joy Ride", just don't do it, if I may suggest. Very cheaply made, rare intriguing scenes, the acting is poor and stunt scenes are catastrophically bad. This is the perfect example of a forced sequel. Overall you can't just get into it because of the pumped up characters themselves. Typical situation were apparently tough rocking guys change attitude after messing up and weeping silly girls becoming invincible and unrealistically able to fight monsters. And this might be pleasant when the story takes you on their side, but it just doesn't happen. You don't get involved at all. Just enjoy the first movie and don't go further.

Paul Andrews Joy Ride 2: Dead Ahead starts as four friends are driving across the open desert on their way to Las Vegas for a party, sisters Melissa (Nicki Aycox) & Kayla (Laura Jordon) & their boyfriends Bobby (Nick Zano) & Nick (Kyle Schmid). While driving down an old dirt road their car breaks down & they find themselves stuck, with no option but to walk they eventually stumble across a house that seems abandoned but as luck would have it a nice car is sitting in the garage full of gas & ready to go. The four decide to borrow it so they can get back to civilisation but when the owner returns later he isn't too pleased that they took his car. A serial killer who calls himself Susty Nail (Mark Gibbon) he sets out to teach the four friends a lesson & starts to psychologically & psychically torture them with his intent to kill them after he's had some fun but the plucky Melissa fights back & tries to outwit & out-think Rusty Nail & save herself & her friends...This American & Canadian co-production was directed by Louis Momeau & is a reasonable time-waster if your desperate & there's nothing else on telly but I would struggle to call it anything else other than watchable. A direct to video sequel to the theatrically released Joy Ride (2001) this is a fairly routine sequel that is more of a rehash of the original than something significantly different, as I said it's not too bad for what it is but Joy Ride 2: Dead Ahead feels a little predictable & a little forgettable. The character's are alright but again with it's cast of perfect looking teens you get the impression Joy Ride 2: Dead Ahead was written & made with demographics in mind, we never learn anything about Ruty Nail & why he decides to play games with the four teens, why not just kill them & be done with it? Why does he not follow up on wanting Kayla's middle finger after making such a big issue of it? The ending feels a little rushed too, how did Bobby get to Melissa so quickly & how did he know where she was? Come to think of it how did Melissa know where Rusty Nail had parked his truck? At just under 90 minutes it moves along at a decent pace, the game of cat & mouse occasionally works but sometimes feels like padding & the body count is maybe a little on the low side. Not bad I suppose but not exactly great either, watchable enough for what it is in a teen horror thriller sort of way.A I said the body count & gore factor is a little disappointing, a woman is decapitated, there's a severed finger, a ripped off jaw & someone gets a steel rod rammed through their head but otherwise not a lot. In fact out of the four lead teens two of them are still standing at the end. There are a couple of impressive looking crashes & explosions including Rusty Nail's truck falling off a cliff in slow motion at the end & exploding at the bottom. Available in an 'Unrated' version on video & an edited cut which gets shown on telly it's safe to assume the Unrated cut is a lot better with added gore (not that there's much to begin with), added nudity (not that there's much to begin with) & added profanity (not that there's much to begin with).With a supposed budget of about $5,000,000 this has good production values & looks nice enough, filmed in British Columbia in Canada although set entirely in the US. The acting is alright, the material isn't great & one dimensional so it was never going to award winning stuff.Joy Ride 2: Dead Ahead is a passable time-waster, it has a decent enough story with some thrills, a bit of gore, a bit of tension & the ultimate question of what will happen next & how will our teen stars get out of it but not much beyond that. Joy Ride 2: Dead Ahead is the sort of film you watch & enjoy it perfectly enough but within a day or two you have completely forgotten it.

pantagruella Cheese is a matter of taste. Some people like strong Cheddar. You can even get seriously strong Cheddar. It's the same with skiing. Extreme skiing is not for everyone.Extreme horror is not for me. I think many enthusiasts would regard this as being mild horror. Oh well, it's strong enough for me. Not really up my street. I prefer monsters and the supernatural, but this film is well-produced, well-acted and delivers the good.The usual tradition with teen slasher films is that the teens are not very nice from the first and we perversely do not wish them well. Here, for a change, three of the people involved are eminently decent. There is an annoying character but he is the agent of the action. Fair play to him, he acted well through several different emotional situations.The villain is appropriately sadistic. A kind of Johnny Cash, I would say, and everything Johnny Cash represents in my limited world view.Production values good. A limited play set but the pieces are handled well.Oh, the scene where the irritating Facebook guy doesn't want to do something is very good. That's where he's arguing that he doesn't want to buy something. I've been in that situation and the Joy Ride version is very true to life.