Highwaymen - La poursuite infernale

"Highwaymen" marks the return of director Robert Harmon and composer Mark Isham to the subgenre of road-film terror they all but established in 1986's landmark horror film, "The Hitcher." Whereas that film coasted on the ambiguity of Eric Red's minimalist script and the bizarre chemistry between a psychopath (Rutger Hauer) and his victim (C. Thomas Howell), "Highwaymen" is a much 'cleaner' version of that film--cleaner in terms of cinematography, violence, and overall appearance. It's an extremely glossy production with well-choreographed action and razor-sharp editing that places you in the midst of chaos rather than just assaulting your senses. Jim Caviezel's jaded victim exudes the right notes of obsession and exhaustion, and Rhona Mitra's pseudo-Sandra Bullock looks go a long way as she joins up to hunt down Fargo (Colm Feore, looking like a refugee from David Cronenberg's "Crash"), a killer who uses his souped-up 1972 El Dorado as a weapon. As he did in "The Hitcher," Harmon shows confident skill in photography, editing, and the decision to keep villain Fargo off camera for the first hour, thereby upping the suspense considerably. Isham's musical score sets a proper mood and is just as effective as his previous work. Where "Highwaymen" comes up short is in its straightforward, bare-bones story (padded out somewhat by the addition of Frankie Faison's traffic investigator); clocking in at a paltry 81 minutes (including end credits), one gets the impression that characters could have been developed further and more action sequences could have been infused into the film. As it stands, "Highwaymen" is in too much of a hurry, but remains a diverting, fine-tuned thriller all the same.

If you are familiar with "The Hitcher," with Rutger Hauer, and liked it, you might like this one. The main difference in the two movies is that in here, the killer never leaves his car. It's not as intense or well-made as the former, but Highwaymen is decent enough for one look. It's very short so you aren't going to be wasting the whole day, anyway.

The story in a nutshell: a serial killer runs down a young woman in his car at random and is not caught for years until Jim Caviezel, whose wife also was a victim of the killer, figures out it's the same guy, and tracks him down for a showdown of his own.

The film starts out well, and is very intense, but loses momentum in the second half. Boredom isn't the problem, it's the credibility of the story. There are just too many holes in the plot and nothing becomes credible. It's no wonder this movie never got much publicity: it has too much of a "B" feel to it, despite Caviezel's presence.

However, it is entertaining and the actual running time of the story is a mere 76 minutes, so if you're looking for an hour-and-a-quarter of escapism, this is it.

This is an easy to watch straightforward thriller. The type of movie you just back and enjoy.

A crazed serial killer is running young women down and it's up to Jim Caviezel to hunt him down. The plot is far fetched as many action thrillers are but the cast do such an impressive job that it's hard not to get involved in the story. Whereby most action movies involve actors of a questionable quality, Jim Caviezel and Rhona Mitra are excellent in this ably supported by Frankie Faison.

There are some terrific high action action moments including one particularly suspenseful one.

My only criticism of the film would be the pantomime bad guy and the fact that the ending is as predictable as a wet English summer. However there is much to enjoy in this film and i'm surprised it wasn't a bigger hit.

Look this film ain't gonna wow audiences and I'm pretty sure there's some enormous plot holes if you dive that far into it, but the concepts kool, the cars sound awesome and all the actors do their jobs pretty well too.

I think the cars really are the star of the show here but all the actors Cavaziel, Mitra and Faison bring enough here to entertain. Personally I would have a liked a bit more backstory for Feores character but maybe that's just me.

Fun popcorn flick that ain't gonna be everyone's cuppa tea but if you like thrillers with a thread of a story, nice sounding cars and pretty good acting then it's a cheeky hour and 17 minutes plus credits.

TLDR- Cars that sounds awesome, nice driving scene's, okay acting. I enjoyed it.

I had heard about this flick awhile back and never got the chance to see it on the big screen because New Line had to go limited release(which is just dumb) so hardly anyone got to see this film which is a shame because it's a real great flick. From the opening moments I was thrown into the world of the film was never bored.Director Robert Harmon does a great job of shooting car chases the way they're never been shot before. The film is more a slasher than anything:it's got the killer who kills with his car,you got Jesus himself,James Caviezel,out on a mission to stop him at all cost and the lovely Rhona Mitra as the woman cought inbetween.Words cannot descibe how cool this film is,the action is bad a$$ and the use of the way they used the car as a weapon was great. Now while this movie isn't perfect, it is a great show and slasher logic does apply to it, if you wanted real world logic than go watch a drama or something...if you want to kick back and watch a cool flick than this is it. Much props go out to director Robert Harmon for bringing out this great film and much love to Rhona Mitra for looking so hot.