Memorable, crazy movie

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Essentially, what we have here are two competing serial killers working in a remote area. Wheeler (Moriarty) drives a big rig as he hunts for victims while Walker (Kole) hoofs it as he targets his victims. Caught in the middle is Stacia (Balk) a young woman who is stranded in the backwoods after the bus she is a passenger on breaks down. There are several very funny moments in a creepy way, like Stacia thinking a couple in the motel room next to hers are having the sex of their lives. I probably don't have to tell you what's actually going on, other than to mention that our merry killers are nearby. The eye-popping finale contains a huge and comical twist. Moriarty is the main reason to watch this flick. He has always been an amazing actor who clearly made a huge mistake when he pulled out of LAW AND ORDER early on.

When a bus breaks down in a desert road surrounded by woods, the passenger Stacia (Fairuza Balk) decides to walk ahead 20 km to a motel. The travelers Birdy (Laurene Landon) and Danny (Malcolm Kennard) get a lift with the deranged serial-killer truck driver Jim Wheeler (Michael Moriarty) to return to a dinning place and are killed. The paranoid Marie (Kristie Marsden) and her husband stay in the bus with the driver waiting for help. When the sadistic serial–killer hitchhiker Walker (Warren Kole) comes to the bus, he kills the trio. Later in the motel, Stacia is disputed by the two psychopaths."Pick Me Up" is a tale of very black humor, where a two-lane road is disputed by serial-killers in a very weird dispute. The movie uses all the clichés of the genre and is funny, and even the names of the two psychopaths (Walker and Wheeler) are hilarious. The surprising conclusion is a big joke and homage to Larry Cohen's "The Ambulance". My vote is seven.Title (Brazil): "Estrada da Morte" ("Road of Death")

Affable, eccentric twisted trucker Wheeler (a marvelously quirky portrayal by the always excellent Michael Moriarty) and vicious drawling hillbilly homicidal hitchhiker Walker (robustly essayed with lip-smacking fiendish relish by Warren Kole) engage in a ferocious territorial dispute on a remote stretch of backroads highway. Brassy, fiercely self-reliant Stacia (a fabulously fiery'n'feisty performance by Fairuza Balk) gets caught in the middle of this lethal battle of wit and wills between two radically different, yet equally deadly itinerant psychos. Ace B-horror flick director Larry Cohen, working from a wickedly clever and witty script by acclaimed splatterpunk author David J. Schow (pitting two major scary icons of the "danger on the road" fright film sub-genre against each other is an inspired stroke of pure deranged genius), ably sustains a steady snappy pace throughout and effectively creates a creepily unnerving atmosphere that's punctuated by occasional outbursts of startling savage violence and culminates in one doozy of a surprise twist ending. Brian Pearson's crisp, handsome cinematography (the overhead camera shots are especially breathtaking), Jay Chattaway's brooding, ominous, but harmonic country score, a pitch-black sense of morbidly funny macabre humor, and a welcome appearance by Laurene Landon as a friendly lady who gets bumped off by Wheeler add substantially to the overall warped fun of this nicely sick and perverse little treat.

Pick Me Up is from the Masters of Horror collection and is about a hitcher / road kill hugger that takes offense to a bus drivers desire to spice up the traveling by hitting animals trying to cross the road. The hitcher finds the bus and takes his anger out on the driver and those on board. A young girl in the bus just misses being hitcher bait several times until… A trucker also looking for the hitcher to exact some revenge comes into the act and uses the young girl as bait. Great acting makes this well directed film a big success in my mind as the pain of the actors comes through loud and clear. Not for anyone who doesn't like some blood and partial nudity.