Synopsis

A young man who escaped the clutches of a murderous hitchhiker is subsequently stalked, framed for the hitcher's crimes, and has his life made into hell by the same man he escaped.

Official Review

The Hitcher is part of a long tradition of road-side horror movies in which urban travelers discover that the open road’s promise goes hand in hand with its shadowy dangers, and stands alongside such stellar examples as Spielberg’s Duel and Mostow’s Breakdown. Rutger Hauer plays John Ryder, a killer with a psychotic gleam in his eye and an ugly knife in his pocket. When C. Thomas Howell’s Jim Halsey picks him up at dawn on a deserted Texan highway, Hauer immediately makes his intentions clear by scaring the boy witless. When the Howell fights back, however, then the hitcher has found what he needs – a decent adversary – and an extreme game of cat and mouse begins on this desolate stretch of highway. Every car that passes, and every poor soul who rides that road, are going to take part whether they want to or not. …Read More