As we previously wrote, the SXSW Film Festival was set to kick off this week in Austin, Texas, and one of the highlights of the Midnight program was The Toll, the Michael Nader-directed psychological thriller that was to World Premiere this coming Sunday, March 15th.

In the film, a young woman (Jordan Hayes) and her rideshare driver (Max Topplin) break down on a dark forest road, and each sees the other as a threat. But as strange phenomena begin occurring around them, they gradually realize they’ve become trapped in the world of a terrifying supernatural being: The Toll Man.

With the filmmakers hosting FREE screenings in both Los Angeles and Austin, Texas this coming Sunday, Bloody spoke with Nader who shares his hope that The Toll will invade the comfort audiences feel in cars.

“There’s something mystical about driving down a dark road at night,” Nader tells Bloody ahead of the SXSW premiere. “How you’re encased in this protective shell, with warmth and music and comfort, as you barrel past a whole dark, forbidding world, and who knows what could be out there that wants to hurt you? The new reality of Rideshare adds an additional possibility: that there might be someone in here that wants to hurt you, too. Which is more dangerous? A driver acting strangely? Or the things waiting out there in the dark? There’s a constant battle occurring in our brains as we navigate the world: what should I really be afraid of, and what’s just a false alarm generated by my brain? How can I tell the difference between paranoia and the threat of real danger? These are the questions I wanted to tackle in The Toll.”

In The Toll, there’s immense tension between Cami (Hayes) and her driver, Spencer (Topplin), which escalates when his car breaks down in the middle of nowhere.

While the “paranoia is built into the script” and “realized by Max and Jordan’s performances,” Nader explains that there was also “significant tension added in the edit, in creating awkward or hostile silences between them, and longer pauses in which we fear what they might do next. It’s the most important, most delicate balance of the film, that their behavior is surprising, but also believable; and that it leaves you wondering through all of 80 minutes if one of them is actually a villain.”

In the middle of their drama is The Toll Man, the supernatural gatekeeper of The Toll.

“The Toll Man is inspired by the historic concept of a Highwayman, or a Gentleman of the Road.”

Nader continues: “In the Middle Ages, traveling on central roads was perilous – there was always a risk of being attacked by masked men with swords who would steal everything in your carriage…and maybe kill you for good measure. The Toll Man is the modern, supernatural manifestation of that idea. If you traverse his road, he may stop you and demand payment, and it will not end well for you.”

Speaking to The Toll Man’s mythology and horrifying design:

“The rules and design of the character were created in the tradition of cosmic or eldritch horror – he comes from an incomprehensible place beyond our world. Everything about him is humanoid but slightly off-kilter. From far away, he might appear to be a man dressed in white – but as he gets closer, it becomes clear that everything about him is very wrong. His skin is almost like a fungus; he has no eyes but only a smiling mouth; one hand is much larger than the other; he is asymmetric. It’s like a being has been brought through from another dimension, and something has gone seriously wrong in the process.”

As Nader reveals, The Toll Man haunts more than one road.

“I would love to see a Toll Man franchise. He goes far beyond this one road – there are backroads across the world that are better left untraversed – where there could be highwaymen lurking just out of sight,” he adds. “Who knows what impact they could’ve had on unexplained, horrific events in history?”

Watch for our review of The Toll out of this Sunday’s special screening and keep your eyes here on Bloody for acquisition and distribution news as it comes in.