Freeway is written and directed by Matthew Bright. It stars Reese Witherspoon, Kiefer Sutherland, Dan Hedaya, Wolfgang Bodison, Brooke Shields & Brittany Murphy. Plot is darkly based around the Little Red Riding Hood fairy tale and sees young runaway Vanessa Lutz (Witherspoon) hit the road after her parents are arrested. Setting off to visit her grandmother she agrees to a lift from the kind and well spoken Bob Wolverton (Sutherland), only to find that he's not as nice as she first thought. He in turn is in for a big surprise himself since Vanessa is more than capable of looking after herself.

Twisted and richly humorous, Matthew Bright's movie oozes originality and quite frankly deserves to be better appreciated: never mind better known! Going into it for a first time completely oblivious to its structure will arguably aid the experience. Suffice to say that the less known about it prior to viewing it the better. All I have to say is that it's violent, sweary and contains very sexually explicit dialogue, so if those things are likely to offend then perhaps stay away from it. But what if I offer up that those things are dealt with a satirical bent? That the tough scenes, and some of them are very tough, are basis to a caustic narrative about social hypocrisy and the often stupidity of the law? Interested? You should be, because once viewed you're unlikely to forget it. It's no surprise to see Oliver Stone's name etched onto the production credits, since this very much feels like a dirty second cousin to his Natural Born Killers. I'd argue that here we have the better acted film with Witherspoon and Sutherland giving virtuoso performances: with admirable support coming from the likes of Bodison, Shields and Murphy.

One of the most undervalued film's of the 90s? You bet it is! 8.5/10

Teenaged Vanessa Lutz (Reese Witherspoon) is illiterate and has a VIOLENT temper. Her prostitute mother has just been jailed so she tries to get to her grandmother. She's picked up by Bob Wolveton (Kiefer Sutherland) who might be a mass murderer...

Film begins and ends like a very perverse version of "Little Red Riding Hood". The middle has Witherspoon trying to get to her grandmothers. The film is VERY VERY violent with virtual non-stop swearing and plenty of sexual talk thrown in. How it got by with an R rating is beyond me. Still, I love it. What the point of this is I don't know, but it's unlike any other film I've ever seen. It's not afraid to push over the limit of good taste and is never dull. Also the acting is just great. Witherspoon attacks her role full force and is just astounding. Sutherland is equally good as the wolf (Wolveton--get it?) and the supporting cast is full of talented actors (Amanda Plummer, Michael T. Weiss, Dan Hedaya) all doing great.

An undiscovered little gem. But be warned--the violence and language is more than a little extreme. NOT for the squeamish.

"Freeway" was one of those movies that we happened to come across, and it turned out to be fairly interesting. We had seen Reese Witherspoon in "A Far Off Place" a few years earlier, but "Freeway" was the movie that really introduced us to her. She plays Vanessa Lutz, a teenage girl who runs away from home and gets picked up by a man named Bob Wolverton (Kiefer Sutherland), only to find out something very unpleasant that leads to a most unusual series of events.

For the most part, you might call this one of those quirky movies that pops up every once in a while. If it has any greater meaning, I guess that it's sort of saying that no matter where we go, there are some things that we just can't escape.