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Possibly the worst tourism video ever produced for the state of West Virginia, now in Hi Def!

Back in 2003, director Rob Schmidt took us on a creepy journey through the backwoods of West Virginia with Wrong Turn, which now hits Hi-Def courtesy of 20th Century Fox. 

Hitting the ground running, an opening scene shows an ill-fated mountain-climbing couple’s encounter with unseen attackers within the woods, then aged-looking sepia toned credits hint at inbreeding and disappearances within the mountains before we meet our cast proper. Chris (Desmond Harrington) takes a detour after finding traffic temporarily stalled out on the highway while a chemical spill is dealt with a few miles up, so he’s cruising the deserted backroads when he smashes into a vehicle left in the road because he’s distracted by some bloated roadkill in his rearview mirror.  He meets the five campers whose vehicle he just destroyed, who are in the process of realizing that they’ve been trapped here on purpose, by barbed wire drawn across the road and tied to trees that blew their tires

The group sets out to look for help, leaving two behind to guard the rubble of the cars and serve as the first victims.  Our other team is comprised of the recently dumped Jessie (Eliza Dushku) and engaged couple Scott (Jeremy Sisto) and Carly (Emmanuelle Chriqui) who head into the forest to search for a dwelling with a phone or someone other passerby who can help them.  As I said, the couple who stay behind quickly become cannon fodder for the locals, but only after hinted at sex and drug use, hearkening back to the 80’s era slashers, which is kind of a nice touch.

Our foursome find a dead end in the road they’ve followed, but are able to locate a large ramshackle cabin in a nearby clearing, which has smoke coming from a chimney and is obviously inhabited, so they make their way down there to try and use the phone that doesn’t exist in this kind of movie.  Finding no one home, they go in anyway (as if Goldilocks hasn’t taught us anything), poking around and finding all the creepy set dressing you’d expect, filthy dishes, flies, discarded piles of other people’s belongings, all the signs that you shouldn’t be there, but no phone, of course.  Carly (for whatever reason) goes off in search of the disgusting bathroom that would be in this type of place, rather than peeing in the nearby bushes, and finally discovers a body, which is enough to get everyone finally moving towards the door, but that’s when the Three Bears return, towing their cars and toting the bodies of their dead friends.

Forced to hide in the house, they see Lindy Booth’s corpse chopped up for dinner before all the hillbillies crash out for their customary afternoon siesta, at which point they try to make an escape, edging out the rusted, squeaky screen door. The hillbillies are hot on their trail before they even get off the porch, and the rest of the film plays out as expected, city folk desperately trying to make their way through the woods with the murderous hillbillies hot on their trail.  This includes some nice use of nightfall, which makes it easier for our heroes to evade them, but just barely.

Wrong Turn looks fairly average in the Blu-ray presentation, the image isn’t as crisp as one would expect considering how sharp outdoor nature scenes normally look in hi-def, which was something of a disappointment.  The special features include a commentary track with Schmidt, Dushku and Harrington, a smattering of deleted scenes (which basically amounted to a make-out scene and numerous takes of Lindy Booth’s death scene), then several fluff featurettes, the highlights of which are the late special effect wizard Stan Winston speaking about his craft and producing the film.

This is a perfectly serviceable horror film, it’s not going to change your life, but it’s not some low-budget direct to video affair either.  It’s definitely worth a rental if you’re looking for something to rent in lieu of the latest Texas Chainsaw re-imagining.

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