What is the "Reeker?": a DVD Review

The movie starts out like a billion other horror movies. For some reason a bunch of young people want to head out into the desert in a rickety car for no foreseeable or justifiable reason. Thus begins the movie "Reeker" which will soon be released through Paramount Pictures on DVD.

This is a movie full of gore and frightening special effects. The main characters are suitably attractive and they all do the requisite things that they are supposed to do in a movie like this. The problem with this movie is that you can feel it is trying to be different. It is bending over backwards to be something new and different. Weird things keep happening and you can't help but say to yourself, "This is all going to mean some big thing at the end."

There are five this time. They meet up on a college campus and they are heading into the desert to visit some kind of club called Area 52. One of them, a guy named Trip, has stolen a bunch of Ecstasy tablets from a drug dealer who makes them in his room. Another is a hippie girl named Cookie. The driver is Gretchen who was born in South Africa. Then there's Nelson and the blind guy named Jack.

They head off into the desert in a woody car that looks like a movie prop meant to break down at a moment's notice. They see a strange accident on the side of the road. They experience a strange earthquake at one point. Then they lose the radio stations and they start seeing eerie things on the side of the road. The diner and motel that they passed earlier is suddenly deserted and spooky when they go back. Then their car breaks down for good and they are, of course, forced to spend the night there.

Strange things keep happening. These things are genuinely scary and genuinely gory and creepy. I have to admit that several times i was on the edge of my seat, afraid to see what was going to jump out at you. There's just one problem.