Plot Details: This opinion reveals minor details about the movie's plot.

My husband wanted to see this, so I snapped up the only remaining copy in the whole store and brought it home. He watched it, and claimed to like it, but whether that was due to the film or Eliza Dushku, I couldn't say at this point. I put the kids to bed and watched it myself, and frankly, I don't see what the hub-bub was about.

Wrong Turn starts off with a guy who's late for an appointment and finds the road blocked, so like an idiot, he goes off in search of another route. This guy, Chris (Desmond Harrington), is a med student or something and as he's driving down this little dirt road (never a good sign), his mustang plows right into another car that's sitting in the middle of the road.

Here he meets Evan (Kevin Zegers) and his girlfriend Francine (Lindy Booth), Carly (Emmanuelle Chriqui)) and her fiance Scott (Jeremy Sisto) and Jessie (Eliza Dushku). They explain that someone has put barbed wire in the road and they've had a blowout. So, the gang decides to split up (never a good sign), leaving Evan and Francine, the token stoners, to guard the vehicles while the others go in search of help. When they come across a little house in the middle of nowhere, they venture in to see if there's a phone and find the house full of expensive stuff and body parts (definitely not a good sign). Pretty soon, they're being hunted by these inbred, deformed cannibal guys who know the woods way better than they do.

For your typical horror flick, I've seen way worse. The problem here is that they don't tell you much of anything about any of the characters, so you don't particularly give two hoots what happens to them. We don't know why the inbred, deformed guys are killing and eating people, I just assume it's because they're backwoods hillbillies and don't know any better, and we don't know too much about the kids they're hunting either. We know that Evan and Francine like to get it on in weird places and smoke pot, and we know that Carly and Scott are madly in love and newly engaged and we know that Jessie's boyfriend just dumped her so they brought her out to the woods for a camping trip. We also know that Chris is a med student (or intern or something like that) and he's late for an appointment in Raleigh, but other than these minor details, we know squat.

This is supposed to take place in the Appalachians or something, I think. They're never very specific about anything except it being West Virginia, and it's pretty country. I have a sort of personal aversion to woods and forest-type places, but I can tell you that this movie certainly doesn't make me want to go there any time soon. This film makes it seem like the folks of West Virginia are a bunch of redneck idiots with no teeth and questionable upbringings.

I've never seen anyone in this movie before except Jeremy Sisto and Eliza Dushku, and Sisto bites it fairly early on. He's a good actor for the most part, but when you're fodder for cannibals, there's not much you can really do with a part like that.

Eliza Dushku is, I suspect, the main reason a lot of people want to see this and I like her. Heck, she's gorgeous and built like that proverbial you-know-what-house we've all heard tell of. I liked her as Faith, the "other" Slayer on Buffy although I've heard that her new series, Tru Calling, is already in some trouble. She generally plays pretty tough females, and Jessie is pretty tough. This girl is a survivor, no doubt about it, and she has some pretty good chemistry with Desmond Harrington, as there is some definite sparkage between Jessie and Chris. I imagine after their ordeal, these two probably mated for life because who else could deal with their issues? And, after being chased around the West Virginia countryside by crazy, deformed guys who want to eat you, you're bound to have some pretty serious issues.

The make-up and effects were pretty good, for those who watch horror flicks for the blood and guts. Stan Winston was in charge of the make-up and he does a pretty good job most of the time. The make-up on our deformed hillbillies is pretty good and there are lots of shots of gore, like a woman with her leg hacked off and barbed wire through her face. There's not tons and tons of gore, certainly not enough for those who like it when they toss buckets of blood around the place, but enough that some people may be turned off by it. It goes without saying, this is rated R for a reason and should not be viewed by the kiddies.

This film is a kind of bizarre Deliverance, like if the hillbillies in Deliverance liked to eat their victims instead of that other thing they did to theirs. Although the movie isn't exactly a resounding endorsement for the West Virginia Tourist Society, the scenery is pretty and there is Eliza to look at as well. A big plus is that these guys knew when to quit, Wrong Turn is a mere 84 minutes long. I could recommend this to horror film fans, because there are a few suspenseful moments and unlike many horror films with young stars, these kids aren't idiots. They know how to survive (well, some of them do anyway) and they fight back the way I suspect real people would. This Wrong Turn is mildly entertaining and would certainly be up to the average horror fan's standards.

Recommended: Yes

Viewing Format: VHS
Video Occasion: Good Date Movie
Suitability For Children: Not suitable for Children of any age