Don’t get me wrong. This is far from a good film. I don’t know why I’m spending the time to review it. It won’t land on any end-of-year list or come close to being nominated for any award. Most people reading this had yet to learn that this franchise received its first (and possibly only) reboot installation. Fewer will feel any desire to see this movie. But if slasher movies are your kind of jam, you could do far worse than this wild ride. The plotline is so far-fetched that you can’t believe you will be unable to take it with any credence.

Also, the acting is atrocious. Its lone recognizable star is Matthew Modine (Any Given Sunday, Pacific Heights), and he has no business being in a film like this. And that’s not to say he’s above a movie like this because he isn’t. This is a film that you’d rather not have anyone that you’d recognize from previous work. Modine’s performance reminded me of how flat an actor he is. He peaked in his first starring role, 1987’s Full Metal Jacket. Since then, he’s had his opportunities to lead (most notably 1992’s box office flop Wind, a film which earned $5.5 million but cost $29 million to make). He’s not a leading man or a character actor, so where does that leave him? The answer is that it leaves him in movies like Wrong Turn, a film that feels like the script was rewritten to include more of him, once Nelson knew that he had signed a name actor.

Freeing itself from the storyline of West Virginian inbred aborigines that hunt down and then hang their human prey from barn hooks, dissecting and preserving their meat. In this sense, our story in the 2021 version makes more sense. If nothing else, it’s far more complex, and there is at least some merit to the decisions behind the “people of the woods.” We need some reason for the killing spree we will experience, and I guess this seems as good as any. In this sense, the movie tries to take itself far too seriously.

Our protagonists are a diverse group of free-spirited, inexperienced young (college-age) hikers who have a common interest in seeking out somewhat of a folklore Civil War fort buried deep off the Appalachian Trail. Our hero is Jen (Charlotte Vega – American Assassin), a liberal do-gooder who dreams of an equal society, and Scott’s daughter (Modine). This is another reason we don’t need an established actor like Modine in this movie. When the daughter and father part ways in the film’s opening moments, we know that Modine isn’t going to reappear. With Jen are her loyal boyfriend Darius, adrenalin junkie Dylan, medical student Milla, and others. We learned early that there would be problems when the group clashed with the locals at a bar near the trail’s entrance the night before their hike. After that, not much happens, but this group of disgruntled men isn’t just going to let a bunch of young outsiders show them up, are they?

Once the group begins the hike, the action starts quickly. In an early sequence, we permanently lose a group member when a massive tree trunk rolls down from a higher elevation, smashing one of her characters against an enormous rock. This setup lets us know that the gloves are off and this group is in danger. So why don’t they turn around and go back? Because this was just an unfortunate random act, their goal of reaching the Civil War fort has yet to be reached. It would have made more sense to kill the group’s “guide” rather than just some random one, thus establishing a realistic scenario where the group was now lost. But that doesn’t happen until the next day when everyone in the group wakes up missing their cell phones…

The idea of both death and killing completely unfazed this young group of idealistic trailblazers much at all. Their ability to process loss seemed easier than running over a squirrel on the road would be for me. It is one of the film’s many flaws, and there are many. And that is okay in a movie such as this. But was this a random act of nature? Or is there something more sinister going on? Well, if I haven’t foreshadowed that this is, in fact, not a random act of nature, then I truly am a poor writer. Someone, or something, doesn’t want this group to continue their trip deeper into their “home” and go to great lengths to keep that from happening.

The 2021 version of this film is much, much more sophisticated than its predecessors. Again, there are reasons for what happens and some thought-provoking ideas behind them. Yet, there are far too many characters and otherwise moving parts to establish credibility. But again, that’s not what we are looking for in a film like this. All in all, Wrong Turn is a wild ride from start to finish. If you look to delve into the slasher movie genre, this franchise reboot is a fine introduction. It could do for you what the original did for me 18 years ago when I watched me freely. If your tastes in movies are more sophisticated than watching a bunch of college-aged kids getting carved up in the less-explored areas of the Appalachian Mountains, I completely understand. If they are not, enjoy this 90-minute escape.