Stuck (2008) Movie Information:

Stuck (2008) Directed by: Stuart Gordon Stuck (2008) Written by: Gordon Strysik, John Strysik Stuck (2008) Cast: Mena Suvari, Stephen Rea, Russell Hornsby, Rukiya Bernard

Stuck (2008) U.S. Distributor: ThinkFilm Stuck (2008) U.K. Distributor: Not available at this time

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Stuck (2008) Synopsis:

Will follow a young woman who commits a hit-and-run, then finds her fate tied to her victim.

Stuck (2008) Movie Review:

Stuck is a crude social satire film that’s premise seems so questionable in reality. However, this film is inspired by a true story that happened in 2001. A woman in Texas was believed to be driving under the influence, struck a homeless man, who became stuck in her windshield. She then drove to her house; lock the car in her garage and the man died two hours later. She was then convicted of murder and sentenced to 50 years in prison.

This film is a fictionalization of that encounter that has different turns and twists. The woman in this story is actually Brandi (Mena Suvari), who is aide at a nursing home that is on her way to a promotion. After celebrating at a local club with her best pal Tanya (Rukiya Bernard), some alcohol and ecstasy, she heads home to meet up with her drug dealing boyfriend, Rashid (Russell Hornsby). While messing with her cell phone, she hits Tom (Stephen Rea), a down-on-his-luck recent evictee. With Tom now painfully stuck and out cold in her windshield, Brandi does drive to a hospital, but then decides to go straight home and but Tom in the garage still stuck in her windshield, and numerous injuries including a broken leg and deep gash in his side. Brandi promises Tom she will get help, but she second guesses her what she has done and how it will affect her promotion opportunity. She then goes in her house, has loud sex with her boyfriend, why Tom is constantly bleeding out in her garage. Rashid is then brought in the situation as the two attempt to figure out the best way to get out of this mess, while Tom looks for anyway to survive and receive medical attention.

Stuck is directed by horror filmmaker Stuart Gordon (Re-Animator, From Beyond), and though this film dabbles in the horror genre, it is still a humorous satire. At times, one will fell guilty for laughing at certain moments in the film, but there is still an ample amount of dark comedy in it. The gore and violence is up close and personal as well, which includes a bloody gorged windshield wiper, a stabbing pen to the eye, a dog biting on an exposed human bone, human feces, and an excruciating toe-nail clipping of an elderly lady. The problem with Stuck is that Gordon and screenwriter John Strysik have a difficult time balancing the horror, comedy, and revenge factors of the film. Not saying that Stuck is a terrible or even bad film, it just struggles with its structure and more than anything its balance. It is about a situation that is unbelievable, but actually similarly occurred. This is not a film for everyone, some will be turned off quickly by its nature, or its explicated rap music opening played over the panning shots of nursing home residents, which is a nicely captured sequence by Gordon.

Mena Suvari goes through high and lows as Brandi, in which goes totally overboard in one sequence dropping f-bombs a little too dramatically. It is still her best work in some time. The great Stephen Rea must have gone though a lot physically, by mostly being stuck in a windshield through the duration on the film as Tom. Rea is a gifted character actor, and this is another strong performance that he can add to his resume. As Rashid, Russell Hornsby is hardly convincing, though he does have some funny moments.

Stuck is weird film about a very unlikely situation. It plays on comedic, horror, and social levels well, but it has problems with balance and precision with these themes

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Stuck (2008) review written by: Bailey Henderson