Kurt Russelll and Kathleen Quinlan star in "Breakdown" from 1997, featuring J.T. Walsh, M.C. Gainey, and Jack Noseworthy. Russell and Quinlan play Jeff and Amy Taylor who are driving from their home in Boston to California, where they are taking new jobs. It looked to me as though they were in Monument Valley - it was similar and in the same general area, but not Monument Valley.When they hit New Mexico, they just barely escape an accident with a truck. At a gas station, the truck driver, Earl (Gainey) confronts them. They high-tail it out of there quick.Later on, their car breaks down, and they're in the middle of the desert with no phone signal. A truck driver, Red (Walsh) stops and offers both of them a ride to a diner where they can phone for help. Jeff does not want to leave the car alone. Amy wants to take the ride. She says that she will go to the diner, call for help, and wait for him.Jeff manages to get the car moving after he discovers some wires had been disconnected, but when he gets to the diner, no one has seen his wife, and the people are very abrupt. Finally, he finds Red, and the trucker tells the police he never picked up Jeff's wife and drove her anywhere. The sheriff even searches the truck. No Amy.This film will remind you of other films, but it is very, very well done. I was a wreck during the whole thing, it was so exciting and scary. In one sense, it was reminiscent of the early TV movie directed by Spielberg, "Duel," and in another way, it was reminiscent of "So Long at the Fair" or "Dangerous Crossing."Russell does a terrific job, as do all the bad guys, of which there are many. The bad guys have not one redeeming quality, one ounce of human compassion - nothing. Really, if you ran into one of the actors on the street you'd want to kick him in the groin.Loved it - highly recommended if you like fast-moving, terrifying, exciting films.

Jeff and Amy Taylor are moving to California and drive across the country. When they find themselves stranded in the middle of the desert with barely anyone or anything around, their trip comes to a halt. Amy takes a ride with a friendly trucker to a small diner to call for help, but as time goes by, Jeff becomes worried. He finds that no one in the diner has seen or heard from his wife. When he finds the trucker who gave Amy the ride, the trucker denies having ever seen her. Now Jeff must attempt to find his wife, who has been kidnapped and is being held for ransom. But who can he trust.......If you can ignore the final ten minutes of this movie, which gives us an obligatory over the top action scene, this is a solid, if nuts n' bolts thriller.Russell plays the middle class Everyman who winds the locals up the wrong way on first viewing, but on second viewing, it's a plausible set up to take advantage of 'city people' taking an unknown route to reach their destination.He's a great choice for the Everyman, calm and collected at first, then bewildered and so on. It's as if we actually see him going through the stages of grief in such a short time, and he plays his character wonderfully. In fact, it's his greatest performance of the nineties.But as good as he is, it's Walsh who steals the film. The scene where he literally denies having seen Amy, when no one else is around them is truly menacing, and just shows how unhinged him and his cohorts are.But as my knowledge and cinematic intellect has changed dramatically in the eighteen years since this release, I've realised that its nothing more than a high concept straight to DVD movie that gained theatrical release because of its star power.If it were released today, it would star Cusack and Cage, and go straight to DVD and vanish without a trace. But in the late nineties, these Hitchcockian-lite thrillers were quite popular, so I can understand its success.So all in all, it's pretty well done for the first hour, the scenery is beautiful, but it loses its mojo and goes unnecessarily action packed for the finale.

Breakdown (1997): Dir: Jonathan Mostow / Cast: Kurt Russell, Kathleen Quinlan, J.T. Walsh, M.C. Gainey, Jack Noseworthy: Chilling film that echos The Vanishing only this film has the added advantage of being a much better film. The title is physically referring to the condition of a vehicle as well as the breakdown of mind and emotion. Kurt Russell and Kathleen Quinlan are vacationing when their vehicle breaks down. Quinlan accepts a ride from a trucker while Russell awaits a tow truck. When she is not at a given destination, Russell and a cop stop the truck but the trucker claims that he has never seen them before. Uncertainty lies at its very core as viewers are not sure what Russell will find. Director Jonathan Mostow provides tension although the conclusion falters with justified violence just to satisfy a hunger that perhaps should be examined first. Russell delivers one of his best performances as a man striving for survival while searching frantically for his wife. Quinlan is appealing in a brief role. The film all depends upon her fate and how it creates turmoil in Russell's mind. J.T. Walsh steals scenes as a trucker who may or may not be responsible for Quinlan's disappearance. There are nasty truckers in the film but they are seen more as thugs than personalities. The film is well made despite wayward elements within its plot solution. It is a vacationer's nightmare. Score: 8 ½ / 10

In BREAKDOWN, Kurt Russell and Amy Quinlan play a wealthy New England couple who find horror in flyover country. While driving across the US, their car breaks down. The various local people they meet who initially seem helpful are in fact criminals working together. The wife is kidnapped, the husband is told to pay half a million to get her back alive, and Kurt Russell decides he'd rather fight.I found this a rather lame movie. Its believability goes way down when, for example, Kurt Russell rides on the bottom of a moving truck trailer and easily finds his way up to the cab. There are obvious continuity and other errors here: a villain gets a brutal rifle blast to his shoulder, but a few minutes later he's driving a car with no visible problems; a small child is shown playing video games (so it's early evening), but a few minutes later in the same scene dawn breaks.About the only entertainment here is the acting of J.T. Walsh and M.C. Gainey, who are caricatures but fun ones. Kurt Russell, on the other hand, acts like he's not particularly happy to have taken this role, and is just going through the motions until he gets his paycheck.I must say that the purported message, if any, of this film is intriguing. BREAKDOWN seems to be suggesting that decent people from the coasts shouldn't venture into the American heartland, since it's the den of rednecks who lie in wait for them.