Many would argue that when a society openly celebrates animal cruelty, its demise is near. Yet when a society begins to care more about the mistreatment of animals than the slaughter of human beings, it's definitely doomed. The Hitcher, if not for the audience reactions it provokes, would be a futile ride unworthy of such speculation about dying civilizations. At a studio-sponsored screening held the night before its opening, the killing of innocent human beings was taken in stride while the multiplex audience seemed truly moved when a jackrabbit gets mowed down.  

By displaying an irrelevant statistic about the number of people killed on U.S. highways each year, the filmmakers try to prepare viewers for the brutal murders of numerous cops and a couple and their young children, in addition to any principal characters who might succumb.

The villain in this remake of the 1986 flick starring Rutger Hauer and C. Thomas Howell is identified in the press notes as "homicidal hitchhiker John Ryder." Are there any other kind? (Well, other than hapless pedestrian victims?) Everyone is at the mercy of the genre's logic or lack thereof; and Ryder, played by Sean Bean, is equally deadly with his thumb stuck out or behind the wheel of a vehicle.  

And in case you thought cell phones have made debates about picking up hitchhikers moot, the two co-eds driving west from Texas for spring break don't get coverage when they need it. Without much preamble, other than exterminating the bunny and the flashing of a little skin, Grace (Sophia Bush) and her boyfriend Jim (Zachary Knighton) nearly run over a hitchhiker on their first, rainy night on the road. Grace persuades Jim not to give the stranded motorist a lift. 

Jim is obviously out of Grace's league and, Good Samaritan that he is, will die an ignominious death worthy of the Spanish Inquisition. A gas station attendant chalks up their relationship to Jim's muscle car -- a 1970 Oldsmobile 442. But he does act heroically after Ryder turns up and finagles a ride (thanks to the pimply clerk), bravely ejecting him from the car. Of course that's not the last of Ryder. When they encounter him the following day, he proceeds to frame them for a brutal killing spree that claims half the cops in New Mexico plus a born-again family driving a retro station wagon.  

While Ryder wants to punish Jim and Grace for ditching him and foiling his initial attempt at murder, he's primarily motivated by a death wish. All the movie's intended and unintended nihilism stems from this fact. A suicidal cipher like Ryder is good for one thing and one thing only: grisly mayhem. There's still no reason his will-to-die couldn't have been woven into the plot better.

Is it significant that the first Ryder was played by Dutchman Hauer and Yorkshireman Bean was cast this time around? There's no indication Ryder isn't a homegrown, Yankee psychopath, but there are signs that Christians in the American heartland somehow deserve to be cruelly dispatched. Call me a cock-eyed humanist, but neither Jim nor Bible-belters deserve to go out in such horrible fashion. And for the record, neither does the bunny.

Multiple opportunities for audience participation, the glossy shots of the New Mexican landscape, and the fact that retribution is doled out by the female are The Hitcher's only virtues. Grace isn't really capable of saving anyone's life. All she delivers is John Ryder's corpse and it's decidedly unsatisfying. "I don’t feel a thing" she declares, giving voice to what the average audience member, save animal lovers, is experiencing. 

(Released by Rogue Pictures and rated “R” for strong bloody violence, terror and language.)