Physical Address
304 North Cardinal St.
Dorchester Center, MA 02124
By Robert Scucci
| Published
If there’s anything I love more than a solid thriller, it’s one that makes me laugh. If it makes me laugh at things I shouldn’t be laughing at, even better. Which is why I’m ashamed to admit that I’d never even heard of 1996’s Freeway until I scrolled past it on Tubi and saw that Reese Witherspoon and Kiefer Sutherland share top billing, and that the film has an agreeable 76 percent score between critics and audiences on Rotten Tomatoes. I loved Election (1999), but admittedly I’m not fully versed in Witherspoon’s filmography. What I do know, though, is that when she’s given an opportunity to go nuts, she knows how to deliver.
I’m happy to say that Freeway is not only solid for its time, but actually holds up remarkably well today because it operates in a lane far enough removed from polite society to feel universal. Its characterization is also so strong that you’re not even thinking about what year it is.
The Ever Elusive I-5 Killer
The less you know about Freewaythe better, because the whole film is a slow crescendo of insanity.
The surface-level plot is simple enough. 14-year-old and illiterate Vanessa Lutz (Reese Witherspoon) runs away from her abusive and neglectful family to start a new life. When her car breaks down, she’s picked up by a charming and unassuming man named Bob Wolverton (Kiefer Sutherland), who she quickly bonds with through conversation, revealing more than she probably should about her questionable upbringing.
Once Vanessa appears comfortable enough around Bob, he reveals that he’s a serial killer known as the I-5 killer, and that she’s about to become his next victim. Vanessa manages to overpower him with the gun her boyfriend gave her before she left home, leaves him for dead, and flees to a diner, where she’s subsequently arrested for shooting the man. Bob survives but suffers permanent disfigurement, and now denies any connection to the I-5 killer whatsoever.
The film quickly transitions from a story of survival to one of revenge. Now trapped in prison and facing the possibility of being tried as an adult, Vanessa needs to figure out how to survive her new surroundings, clear her name, and somehow kill Bob, who thinks he’ll never have to answer for his crimes.
Reese Witherspoon Is A Force Of Nature
Freeway is one of Witherspoon’s best early performances, and she fully commits to Vanessa’s insane adventure. She convincingly portrays a young woman who’s wise beyond her years despite her illiteracy, in the sense that her survival instincts are more evolved than those of somebody 20 years her senior. She hams it up with the officers when she knows she’s in trouble, but she also knows when to show her teeth when her safety is compromised, whether she’s in a holding cell, on the streets, in prison, or back at home.
Remember how I said this movie is funny? It comes from how terrifying she is when in a state of shock or self-defense. When she walks into that diner to gather her senses, she calmly sits down and orders food, completely unaware that she’s pretty much covered in Bob’s blood until the waitress points it out.
Kiefer Sutherland is an absolute menace, and his straight-faced intensity is brilliantly offset by Witherspoon’s confrontations when the timing is just right. It’s one of those dynamics that makes you wish they’d worked together on more projects. I don’t think we’d get the same performance out of Witherspoon if Sutherland weren’t so perfectly cast as Bob Wolverton. He toes the line between charming and creepy flawlessly, which is exactly how I imagine a serial killer living a double life would act when his old ball and chain isn’t around, or even aware of his whereabouts for that matter.
Freeway never wears out its welcome, and I strongly recommend it to anybody looking for a solid, straight-up thriller. Just when you think it can’t escalate any further, it finds a way. While there’s no real moral ambiguity here, it’s a raw and exciting take on the kinds of true crime stories that are all over your Netflix feed.
As of this writing, you can stream Freeway for free on Tubi.
