Reviews
Runaway Car (1997)
...so much more than a TV movie.
Some may consider Runaway Car to be cheap exploitation--a Speed-ripoff in the high-occupancy lane. But this made-for-T-V thriller starring Judge Reinhold and Nina Siemazsko is so much more. Yeah, it's about a car that can't stop. But, Runaway Car is a wake-up call, a nightmarish fantasy about the total breakdown of the service industry. Siemazsko is Jenny, a nurse-in-training who nearly causes a botched operation. Upset, she picks up her car from the shop, where a desperate Reinhold finds out his car won't be ready for another week. He's got an important meeting with venture capitalists interested in his website idea. Jenny volunteers to give him a lift, but first they must pick up her sister's infant daughter. Baby makes three, and they're off. But before they can get out of the subdivision, they nearly run over wisecracking skateboarder Dex (Brian Hooks). He's hurt his knee, so Jenny offers to take Dex to the emergency room over the objections and grumbling of Ed. When they hit the freeway, the gas pedal gets stuck to the floor. When they try to pull it up, it breaks off, as does the key in the ignition. Soon the car is barreling down the freeway out of control. A good-hearted cop (single-named actor Leon) rides by their side trying to help, but much of the force would just as soon `take them out' as let them cause a pile-up. Also offering support is a police dispatcher who's (you guessed it) one day from retirement and a couple of talk-radio jocks. But they can do little for this disaster on wheels. Can they find a way to stop the car before it plummets off a raised drawbridge? Can a traffic helicopter lift the baby to safety? Did that cop really say, `It's not just a drawbridge-it's the end of the line'? This being on FOX, the answer is, of course, yes. The real moral of this story-know your mechanic.