Set in the beautiful desolation of the Utah desert and centering on a typical middle-American husband (Kurt Russell) desperately searching for his mysteriously missing wife, “Breakdown” is a first-class movie thriller, technically awesome and outrageously exciting right up to the last unbelievable second.
It’s the best high-tech nail-biter of its kind since “Speed.” But why stop there? For me, it’s easily better than “Speed,” the 1994 racing L.A. bus shocker in which stunning mechanical expertise triumphed over a wacky threadbare story line.
Here, the movie has firmer story logic, a nicer buildup. There are better characters, more believable villains. And though “Breakdown” pulls us into the same kind of big-movie nightmare territory as most expensive Hollywood thrillers, it doesn’t try to fob off as many preposterous plot twists or overpower us with technology.
The first theatrical feature of young director/co-writer Jonathan Mostow, it’s an often dazzlingly assured suspense movie, an old-fashioned American cliffhanger show updated and modernized to a breathless sheen. Even better, it shows respect for our sense of how things happen in the real world. Not enough respect, perhaps. But Mostow tries to keep us interested in characters as well as predicaments, the background as well as the violence against it.
In its big set-pieces — chases, fights, a white-knuckle standoff and a scene where Russell crawls around the undercarriage of a truck racing along the highway — the movie is done with high physicality and stunning technique.
To get us on the hook, Mostow uses that old effective thriller gambit: the “vanishing lady” premise. First, he introduces us to a happy, handsome couple, Jeff and Amy Taylor (Russell and Kathleen Quinlan), driving along in a red Jeep Grand Cherokee through Utah’s spectacular Moab desert, with its mesas and white plains. On their way from Massachusetts to California, they cruise through the vast and sandy spaces on a blazingly sunny day, so typical and likable a pair, we might be prepared to follow them into a romantic comedy (or a Jeep commercial) instead of a nightmare.
But soon, with unusual abruptness and viciousness, their space is invaded. Jeff nearly crashes into a car that abruptly cuts and swerves in front of them. At the next gas station, the offending car’s driver, Earl (M.C. Gainey) — an insolent bravo with Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers mutton chops — swaggers up and verbally trashes Jeff. Later, trying to gun the Jeep out of this bully’s range, Jeff reaches an empty desert area and then apparently overheats the car, which stalls on the highway. Soon, Earl has caught up with them again, pulled past, and stopped and parked up ahead in a bend of the road.
To the rescue comes an affable trucker, Red Barr (J.T. Walsh), who offers the Taylors a lift to Belle’s Diner up the road, where they can call for a tow. Worried about leaving his car with Earl lurking around, Jeff refuses. Amy accepts. Within moments, she’s gone.
After they leave, Jeff discovers his problem: some disconnected wires dangling under the Jeep. But later, at Belle’s Diner, he finds that Amy isn’t there. And when he tries to ask questions, he’s met by wariness, indifference and a paunchy, sly-looking counterman who can’t meet his gaze. Even worse, when he spots Red’s truck minutes later on the road and tries to flag him down, Red ignores him. And when Jeff, furious, blocks the truck and hails a passing sheriff (Rex Linn), he gets the nastiest surprise.
Red denies ever seeing him or his wife. The nightmare kicks into high gear.
The “vanishing lady” premise is based on a real-life incident that took place during the 1889 Paris Exposition: A woman’s brother disappeared and everyone the two had previously met at their hotel denied his existence. This incident (and its solution) were re-created in the 1950 Jean Simmons-Dirk Bogarde picture “So Long at the Fair,” directed by Terence Fisher. The most famous and brilliant version of the plot is Alfred Hitchcock’s 1938 spies-on-a-train classic “The Lady Vanishes.” And the most remarkable recent example is George Sluizer’s 1988 Dutch thriller “The Vanishing” (remade ineffectively in 1993 Hollywood).
“Breakdown” isn’t as clever as its predecessors. But it does have almost unbearably intense action scenes, a vulnerable, likable hero and backdrop that begins to add its own sense of terror, menace and doom: all those desert stretches and former Western movie sites, irresistibly reminiscent of John Ford’s fabled movie location, Monument Valley, Utah.
Kurt Russell plays Jeff as a smart but inexperienced guy who has to get tough as the nightmare deepens. It’s the same sort of progression he played in the silly plane hijack movie “Executive Decision,” where he started out as a dude in a monkey suit and gradually took over a commando operation. But in “Breakdown,” he’s easier to accept. Russell’s careful touch of nervousness and insecurity increases the mood of mounting anxiety.
That throws the spotlight on the villains, and they’re worthy of it: Gainey and his cohorts (whose names I won’t identify to preserve a surprise or two) give a scorching impression of rural evil. Towering over all of them is J.T. Walsh as Red.
Walsh specializes in American pragmatists and bull-necked business types. With his heavy frame and pale eyes, and his easy but slightly cold chatter, he perfectly incarnates the midrange hustlers or operators he usually plays. Red, though, is something else: a great movie heavy. Walsh has several moments in this movie that are blood-chilling — all the more so because we never quite forget our first glimpse of him, as the generous, helpful passerby with his heartland manners and casual competence.
As a director, Jonathan Mostow shows all the skills any action movie director could want. The obvious reference point for “Breakdown” is the 1971 car-trucker chase movie “Duel,” which made the reputation of the 23-year-old Steven Spielberg. And it doesn’t suffer by the comparison. Mostow may lack some of Spielberg’s skill and flash, but he shows a lot of crowd-pleasing flair and logistical finesse of his own.
The acid test of “Breakdown” is that it’s just as absorbing when the Jeep is parked on the highway and Jeff and Amy are warily eying their pursuers as when it’s going full throttle, with guns blazing and tires screeching. Most movie “rides” are only worth taking if you’re bored. “Breakdown,” in high gear all the way, reminds us of how effective it can be to dangle heroes or heroines over bridges and cliffs, and to let evil temporarily take over the road.
”BREAKDOWN”
(star) (star) (star) 1/2
Directed by Jonathan Mostow; written by Mostow, Sam Montgomery; photographed by Doug Milsome; edited by Derek Brechin, Kevin Stitt; production designed by Victoria Paul; music by Basil Poledouris; produced by Martha De Laurentiis, Dino de Laurentiis. A Paramount release; opens Friday. Running time: 1:36. MPAA rating: R. Language, sensuality, nudity, violence.
THE CAST
Jeff Taylor …………………….. Kurt Russell
Red Barr ……………………….. J.T. Walsh
Amy Taylor ……………………… Kathleen Quinlan
Earl …………………………… M.C. Gainey
Billy ………………………….. Jack Noseworthy
Sheriff Boyd ……………………. Rex Linn
