The Drifter Review

MPAA Rating: R
Released: 1988

The Drifter was a low-budget thriller that I never caught during the 80's. I came across it recently while digging around for some obscure gems from that decade, and instantly it caught my attention with its promising premise. A woman has a one-night stand with a mysterious hitchhiker and soon comes to regret her decision when he begins stalking her. Add in the fact that Miles O'Keeffe, one of the cooler B-movie stars I've seen, played the role of the obsessed drifter and you should have a formula for success.

You should, but as the Feature Attraction will show nothing in life is guaranteed.

When I discovered The Drifter I jumped on this movie quicker than a redneck jumps on his second cousin. Why? I'm a sucker for thrillers that involve hitchhikers. Mama always taught me not to pick up strangers, so it's always interesting to see people get what's coming to them when they don't heed such advice. On film, of course!

Julia Robbins (Kim Delaney) is traveling the barren and dusty desert on her way back to Southern California when she stumbles across a handsome hitchhiker named Trey (Miles O'Keeffe). Against her better judgement she decides to offer him a ride, both in a vehicular sense and a sexual manner.

While she intended the encounter to be a one-night stand, our buddy Trey has other ideas. You see, he's a good old boy that firmly believes when a woman makes love to you, you're destined to be together forever. It's just a shame that the object of his affections was a modern 80's woman that went through men faster than most of us go through our underwear.

After parting ways with Trey, Julia heads on home to see her boyfriend Arthur (Timothy Bottoms), believing that she'll never see the drifter again. But as we saw above, she was wrong… very wrong. Trey discovers her residence, her place of work and her phone numbers, and he wastes no time availing himself to all three in an effort to convince her that he's the man for her.

The rejections and police complaints mount up, but the stalking takes a deadly turn when Julia's best friend is brutally murdered on Julia's own bed. It's bad enough killing a woman's best friend, but doing it on her bed is just plain inexcusable. Washing bloodstains off sheets is a royal pain.

At any rate, this bloody encounter raises the ante a bit. Can the police and Arthur protect Julia from the obsessed lunatic, or will they drop the ball and let her croak louder than the frogs by the pond outside my house?

Perhaps a better question would be: do we really care?

Julia is a pretty unlikable gal – I have no idea what Trey saw in her. It's normally not a good sign when you root for the bad guy during a movie, but root for him I did! Of course as with any thriller, not everything is as it seems.

The basic premise for The Drifter should have spelled instant success, but the inclusion of some atrocious actors and a good deal of inane dialogue really dragged the movie down. Just how bad is the script? I lost any hope of this film scoring well when Julia held her boyfriend at gunpoint and barfed up this gem: "Pull down your pants. I want to see if I should shoot it off or suck it."

I mean… really. Who thinks up crap like that? Is that supposed to be a turn-on? Actually, don't answer that. Consider it a rhetorical question, because I fear that some reading this might actually be nodding their head enthusiastically. And if you're one of these individuals – this movie is for you!

Okay, to be fair I will state that The Drifter isn't all that bad. Yes, it has some terrible dialogue scattered here and there. Yes, it has some acting that was so bad it nearly drove me to drink. Yes, it has some plot twists that make about as much sense as I would after imbibing on the aforementioned liquor. But even despite all those flaws, there is a serviceable foundation that makes for a barely passable thriller.

Movie rating: 4 stars

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Other Resources:

The Drifter IMDb Page

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