The Hitcher (1986)

May 21
1h 4m

Episode Description

Shat The Movies hits the open road with The Hitcher, the 1986 horror-thriller that transformed an ordinary highway drive into pure nightmare fuel. Starring Rutger Hauer as the terrifying and impossibly calm John Ryder, the film follows a young traveler who makes the mistake of picking up a hitchhiker—and spends the rest of the movie trying to survive the consequences.

Gene and Big D break down why Hauer's performance feels less like a human villain and more like an unstoppable force of nature, debate whether C. Thomas Howell's Jim is incredibly unlucky or catastrophically stupid, and revisit the movie's bleak, sweaty atmosphere that makes every gas station and desert highway feel hostile. Along the way, the guys discuss the film's infamous truck sequence, the bizarrely useless police force, and why this movie permanently convinced an entire generation never to pick up hitchhikers.

Full movie info below

While transporting a car across the Southwest, a young man picks up a mysterious hitchhiker who quickly reveals himself to be a sadistic killer. Framed for a string of brutal murders and hunted by police, the driver is forced into a deadly game of survival across endless desert highways.

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