Breakdown (1997)

Tautly directed and superbly photographed, this crowd-pleasing thriller from 1997 is indebted to Steven Spielberg's Duel, but more closely resembles Dead Calm in its strengths and weaknesses. Kurt Russell plays a stressed-out husband whose wife (Kathleen Quinlan) disappears after their car breaks down in the desert. Tracking her whereabouts leads to an interstate theft and kidnapping ring, and as Russell pursues--and is pursued by--a vicious redneck played to perfection by J.T. Walsh (in one of his final film roles), the movie succumbs to several tense, but utterly conventional action sequences. That doesn't stop the movie from being an above-average nail-biter. It is so effectively directed by co-writer Jonathan Mostow that even the more surreal situations seem plausible and altogether unsettling. Russell's performance is key to the film's success--he's smart enough to be admirable, and we can readily identify with his frustration, confusion, and torment. Through him, Breakdown takes on the edgy quality of a wide-awake nightmare. --Jeff Shannon Amazon.com

For an honest,nail-biting,slickly directed,tensely paced good 97 minutes

BREAKDOWN is usually not my kind of film;but you know...it works in what it sets out to do,keeping your heart pounding with great car chases and crashes,vigilante-ism and slick direction from writer/director Jonathan Mostow (U-571) and a spot-on soundtrack by Basil Poledouris whose acute sense of action music is the perfect propeller of this fairly predictable thriller.
Massachusetts transplantees Jeff and Amy Taylor (Kurt Russell and Kathleen Quinlan) are driving to a new life in California when their jeep breaks down.There has already been an incident on the road with some local rednecks that have unsettled the couple.A seemingly helpful trucker (the late great J.T.Walsh-who could do this role better!) stops to offer them a ride to a nearby diner.Amy accepts and that's where the film takes off.She is nowhere to be found,Jeff wonders if he has gone nuts,the whole set of redneck locals seem to be somehow in on it and Jeff goes to the most extreme measures to uncover the plot to kidnap his wife.
The editing in this film is slick and a scene involving a pickup and a semi hanging off of a bridge is priceless and appropriately palm-sweating.This is not the greatest film in the world,but for the type of film that it is,and clocking in at a smart 97 minutes (instead of the 120+ that we seem to keep getting nowadays!),BREAKDOWN keeps pace with the best of action-thrillers.
Kurt Russell's performance is really the key to this film.Russell is known for doing a majority of his stunts, and he really does get banged-up a lot.
Highly recommended for a tense time if that is what you need to get jolted. September 27, 2007

excellent direction/performances/action sequences

Terrific thriller that keeps you on the edge of your seat until the very end.

Contains one of the most hair-raising fight scenes (that takes place on a bridge)
between J.T. Walsh's meany and Kurt Russell's good guy, that I've ever seen.

Director Jonathan Mostow does amazing work here. A natural. September 9, 2007

High tension thriller!

Breakdown is a very smart and creepy thriller that states a crude reality; when a couple is stranded in the middle of nowhere (in a very isolated place) by a mechanical deterioration, his wife decides to drink a lemonade due the high temperature and accepts a hitch hike of a truck driver, will be the genesis that will arouse the unexpected vanishing of her, and so he will have to undertake by himself all his talent to bein a zealous search in a village that doesn't feature by being kind and disposed to aid him.

That dramatic struggle against the time, the febrile anguish and the fear generated by this coward kidnapping is magnificently told, with (at least to my mind) and supported by the best performance on screen until this date by Ken Russell and the epic means he will have to employ to rescue her. Adrenaline, high tension and hair raising sequences will lead us to a very credible final.

Kudos too, for this promise of the direction: Jonathan Mostow, the same who filmed four years later, the cult movie U-571.
August 16, 2007

Joyride meets the Texas Chainsaw

Breakdown is a terrifying movie that enters the timeliest fears of our time, joyfully and perhaps sardonically representing what happens when we find out that our $50,000 sport utility vehicle isn't enough to protect us from all the nasty human unsavory people that are out there in the world just waiting to kick us a big on in the face.
Kurt Russell is Jeff Taylor and his wife, Amy (Kathleen Quinlan), have pulled up roots in Massachusetts to move cross-country via the driving method. After talking to a redneck trucker because their Jeep breaks down in the Utah desert, the terrifing fun begins. Just like in Spielberg's Duel, malevolence arrives in the semblance of a big truck. The trucker named Red (J.T. Walsh) agrees to give Amy a lift to the nearest pay phone while Jeff stays with the car.
Now, it's easy to wonder why in the world Jeff would let his wife ride off with a total stranger in an 18 wheeler, but put yourself in the same situation and you would probably do the same thing. One goes to get help, the other stays with the automobile.
Amy disappears, never turning up at Belle's Diner, where she was supposed to meet with Jeff. The customers have never seen her. And when Jeff chases down Red's rig, Amy is nowhere to be found. Worse, Red claims that he's never seen Jeff before in his life.
What now happens is, "lets find the wife." What an awesome thrill ride that the entire cast gives, especially Russell as the nervous, ready to enter the booby hatch husband who let his wife loose the grip of his loving hand back on that lonesome highway when a nice trucker said, "Come with me, I can help." Russell turns out an amazing performance as the obsessed husband who let his wife get away. He becomes totally focused, almost obsessively so to find out why this town has never seen his wife, lips are shut tight and you definitely get the opinion this is CreepVille, Utah.
Rent it. What a fun ride. You will have sweaty palms throughout.
August 6, 2007

Truck stop terror that never stops

There are certain elements to the film Breakdown that could have made it nothing more than a B-grade bore. The plot is relatively simple and the outcome is not unexpected. The keys to this film were two things: Great actors backed by a plausible storyline. The vacant, empty roads that stretch on for miles and miles quickly take away an advantage of someone if another who knows the area means them harm, and that is what Jeff Taylor and his wife Amy soon find out as they travel cross country to California. As stated earlier, the actors in here are great. The fact that besides you have Kathleen Quinlan playing Amy Taylor, you also have smaller but important roles played by familiar faces. Jack McGee (Rescue Me, Crash) is a bartender and Rex Linn (Cliffhanger, Drop Zone) plays a Sheriff that Russell's character discovers may or may not be in on what turns out to be a horrendous kidnapping ring.

Kurt Russell is superb as Jeff Taylor, Russell is able to play his character with great conviction, as we see Jeff turn from surprised, to worried to fearful and finally, to resourceful. The "bad guys" in this film are fun because they are actually halfway smart and display an interesting system of catch and grab which is backed up by the vital use of CB radios. This truly is an overlooked gem in the catalog of thrillers that have come out in the past fifteen years, and it has elements of everything from "The Hitcher" to "Joy Ride" in it.

As Jeff's wife comes up missing, Jeff realizes he can trust nobody he runs into throughout his journey in the film. Often times that does not matter because this thing is so full of suspense that half the time Jeff is doing all he can to keep from dying, let alone try to find somebody he can trust. Great chase scenes coupled with a "hunter vs. hunted" atmosphere makes Breakdown a fantastic late 90s thrill ride to pull from the vault and enjoy.
July 28, 2007

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