This 1981 suspensor was once the most expensive Australian film ever made. It wasn’t a success, suffering from a severe disconnect between the intentions of producer-director Richard Franklin, a Hitchcock buff who was coming off 1978’s successful PATRICK (and would go on to direct PSYCHO II, CLOAK & DAGGER and F/X 2), and those of its major financier Avco-Embassy, with Franklin wanting to craft a stealthy REAR WINDOW inspired suspensor and Avco-Embassy a slasher pic. It was on the company’s insistence that the lead actors be American, resulting in Stacy Keach and Jamie Lee Curtis being cast, which led to trouble with the Australian actor’s equity union.
Beyond that, ROAD GAMES is a quintessential example of Ozploitation, bearing many names common to the cycle, including screenwriter Everett De Roche, composer Brian May and cinematographer Vincent Monton. I say it’s one of the best such films, although like most Ozploitation flicks, it’s not without shortcomings.
A ten minute pre-credits prologue introduces us to Pat Quid (Keach), a highly idiosyncratic truck driver harboring a half-dingo named Boswell. Quid is initially seen spying on a green van driving creep (Grant Page, also the stunt coordinator), identified in the credits as “Smith or Jones,” entering a Melbourne hotel with a young woman. The latter, as a viewpoint shift makes clear, is killed by Smith-or-Jones, who on the following morning leaves her body parts in trash bags outside the hotel.
Following the (belated) opening credits, Quid and Boswell set out on a lengthy haul through rural Australia. Several interesting people are seen on the road, including a boat hauler, a bickering family, a honeymooning couple and Smith-or-Jones in that aforementioned green van. Quid also learns of the suspicious disappearances of several female hitchhikers that have piqued police interest.
Before long he picks up the first of two passengers: Frita (Marion Edward), a part of the bickering family seen earlier who for some reason has been left alone on the road. She quickly grows creeped out by Quid, the first inkling of a widespread suspicion that he might be the kidnapper-killer.
Frita is ultimately reunited with her family, and Quid picks up his second passenger: a young woman (Curtis, who has what amounts to an extended cameo) he calls Hitch. The two have real chemistry, and appear to be moving toward a romance, but then she inexplicably vanishes. Quid suspects Hitch might have shacked up with Smith-or-Jones, or may perhaps have taken the place of one of the pig carcasses in his truck, but he doesn’t learn the truth until the inevitable final showdown with Smith-or-Jones, which occurs after a car-truck chase—in which, as Franklin admits, the vehicles, in direct contrast to most movie chases, go slower and slower.
This film is, first and foremost, expertly directed. The suspense is cunningly rendered, as are the action sequences, especially a nerve-jangling bit involving the smashing up of a boat on the highway (accomplished entirely without music). The pacing is fast and the widescreen imagery superbly utilized, while characterization is paid great attention; Franklin spends an unusual amount of time establishing the quirky nature of his hero and the many interesting people he sees on the road, a gambit that pays off in the later scenes, in which those people all play a part.
The script by Everett De Roche is strong, despite the fact that it breaks several hard-and-fast storytelling rules. The gratuitous viewpoint shifts to the doings of the bad guy, breaking Quid’s omniscience, are unneeded distractions, and the ending, involving an implausible grand guignol flourish that was admittedly tacked on at the behest of the financiers, isn’t fully satisfying.
Stacy Keach proves an extremely compelling and sympathetic lead, albeit with an appropriately demented edge that recalls his earlier work in THE KILLER INSIDE ME (1976) and THE NINTH CONFIGURATION (1980). His Americanness is never commented on, but generates a real sense of isolation—although the fact that he happens upon another American person in this rural Australian setting is somewhat less than plausible.
Vital Statistics
ROAD GAMES
Quest Films
Director/Producer: Richard Franklin
Screenplay: Everett De Roche
Cinematography: Vincent Monton
Editing: Edward McQueen-Mason
Cast: Stacy Keach, Jamie Lee Curtis, Marion Edward, Grant Page, Thaddeus Smith, Stephen Millichamp, Alan Hopgood, John Murphy, Bill Stacey, Roberth Thompson, Ed Turley, Angie La Bozzetta, Colin Vancao, Paul Harris, Rochelle Harris, Tony Bishop, Abbe Holmes, Carol Ann Aylett