Switchback (1997)

Directed by Jeb Stuart. Starring Danny Glover, Jared Leto, Dennis Quaid, R. Lee Ermey, Ted Levine, William Fichtner, Leo Burmester, Maggie Roswell, Allison Smith, Kevin Cooney, Walton Goggins, Merle Kennedy, Julio Oscar Mechoso. [R]

Thriller follows two parallel storylines—in one, a genial but untrustworthy man named Bob (Glover) picks up a reticent hitchhiker (Leto), also untrustworthy, and they travel together across the West; in the other, a cheerless and dogged FBI agent (Quaid) works with (and around) local law enforcement in Texas to catch a serial killer who has kidnapped his son. Obviously, one of the two travelers in the other narrative thread is going to turn out to be the serial killer, and as if the identity isn’t already pretty easy to figure out based on bait-and-switch expectations, the script goes ahead and reveals the secret with more than a half-hour left to go. Writer/director Stuart’s script is such a mess of bad dialogue, clichés, close calls, contrivances, and copy-and-paste episodes (e.g., the prologue is right out of a “classy” slasher), he tries to juice up the tired material with fight scenes, shootings, stunt jumps on and off of a train, and the like, which are reasonably well-executed, but without at least one solid character at the center of it all, who cares? Leto struggles with the guarded persona needed to “fool” the audience about what his motivations/background may be, Glover is all over the map with his incredulous personality shifts (avuncular one moment, menacing the next), and Quaid seems to be trying for quiet intensity but lands on dull monotone. The sub-plot on Quaid’s side of the tracks about Ermey’s sheriff trying to use the case to his advantage amid a re-election campaign should have either been developed more and given a satisfying payoff or dropped entirely.

38/100