I've taken a lot of flack from friends and co-workers for liking this movie, I can't seem to figure out why. It's a very effective horror thriller that is a step above other films of it's ilk that have come out in recent years. It has a great setup, the first third of the film is as creepy as it gets, granted it degenerates towards the end, but it doesn't take enough away from the film to keep it from being a good film.

The film opens with a brother and sister driving down a barren Midwest highway, they are on their way home for spring break. Suddenly, am old battered truck comes bearing down on them, and continues on down the road. A little while later they pass an old church where they see the truck's driver dumping what looks like a body down a pipe.

What follows the age old question of whether to go back and look or not. Most normal people would continue on, but this is a movie, not reality, so they go back and take a peek. This detour triggers the start of the end for these two, and tension that builds, reaches a plateau with a lousy plot device, and delves into the familiar survival horror vein before ending in a decidedly un-Hollywood fashion.

The best way to look at this movie is to take it as three separate sections. The first section being the best. This first section encompasses the initial contact with the Creeper truck. We don't get any real good look at our bad guy, but we feel his presence, the speeding truck,, the dumping of the body, the frantic chase down the highway. We watch the two drop deeper into shock and fright as they realize they can't stop the coming horror. The next section brings us face o face with the evil, the Creeper is revealed, and is seen to be something not quite human. We also watch our stars move beyond their initial shock and have a growing determination to stop this thing, with occasionally humorous results. This leads us to the survival horror section with our heroes trapped inside of a police station with the Creeper wreaking havoc. I will not spoil the ending, but it was nice to see something that didn't have that typical Hollywood style ending.

A lot of good things are done well. First off the build up to the reveal of what the Creeper is done well, especially with the use of the truck, and the the long shots. The reveal of his supernatural nature and the rather strange things that he does with his victims, not to mention what he needs them for. The two leads are good, giving us a different dynamic than the usual romantic entanglements, a nor familial connection. A number of gags used throughout is good, the scarecrow, the multiple run over's of our baddie, and the truck's license plate, just to name a few. The design of the Creeper is unique. The one character we didn't need was the psychic, all that was, was a cheap way of giving exposition, and I find it to be a bit of a cheap way to expand the story, lazy writing if you will.