Quicksilver Highway Movie Review 63

This movie was a made for TV horror which featured stories from Stephen King and Clive Barker.It stars Christopher Lloyd and it is directed by Mick Garris who also directed Desperation, The Stand and Riding the Bullet.

Aaron Quicksilver(Lloyd) is a travelling showman who tells his strange tales to those he encounters on his travels. The movie begins with a newly-wed couple stranded on a road in the middle of nowhere. The husband goes off to look for help, leaving his bride in the car. Day turns into night and there is no sign of him. She begins to get worried and she wonders what has happened to him.A car comes along and a strange looking man gets out. It is Aaron Quicksilver and he offers to wait with her until her husband returns. She enters his house on wheels and sits down with him. He tells her a story called The Chattering Teeth which was written by Stephen King..


The story begins with a guy called Bill(Raphael Sbarge) who is driving home for his son's birthday. There are terrible winds in the desert and he has to call his wife to tell her that he wont be able to make it. His son is upset. Bill decides to try it anyway.He is driving along when he almost hits a hitchhiker. He decides to pull in at a place called Scooters grocery and tries to make the call,but the phone isn't working. He sees a pair of toy teeth sitting behind the counter. Scooter says that they are broken, but that he will let Bill have them cheap. His wife isn't so keen on giving them away. Scooter decides to give them to Bill for his son. Bill meets the hitchhiker outside and when he asks Bill for a ride, he agrees. Bill tells the hiker that he will give him a lift if he does not smoke inside the van.

After a while, the hitcher starts to annoy him. He begins to light up a cigarette and Bill begins to get mad. The hitcher pulls a knife on Bill and wants the van and his money. Bill won't pull over and he acts crazy and crashes the van. They bot survive the crash but the hiker tries to kill Bill. The teeth begin to move on their own. Bill tells the teeth to bite the hitcher and the hitcher laughs at this. He is bitten on the nose by the teeth and he screams in agony as the teeth chew his fingers off and attack him. The teeth free Bill from his seat belt and he gets out of the van. They drag away the hikers body. We cut to nine months later and Scooter has passed away and his wife, Myra is running the place now. She remembers him and she gives him back the chattering teeth which turned up on the doorstep. Cut back to the abandoned bride and Aaron Quicksilver who see a car coming. It has hit somebody. It is the husband and he is dead. The teeth drag him off into the desert!

The second story is called The Body Politic and it is about hands that have a mind of their own. There is a pickpocket taking money from people at a fairground and he wanders into Quicksilver's tent where the latter shows him a hand which belonged to a dead man. He tells him that it is magic. He begins to tell the tale of a plastic surgeon who does surgery for rich people who really don't need it. He finds that his hands are beginning to move independently of him and that they seem to have a mind of their own. He finds out that they are trying to kill him so that they can be free of him.He speaks to his therapist about it. He goes home and the hands make him kill his wife. He can't stop them. He cuts one off. His hand goes on the run and it gets other hands to join in. People are cutting hands off everywhere. The hands go on the run. The hand wants to take over and the plastic surgeon won't let that happen.He goes up to the roof and the hands follow him. He throws himself off the building and the hands follow suit.

In the end, a woman is in bed in hospital when her nose begins to move by itself so she cuts it off and it all begins again! The pickpocket's hands begin to have a life of their own and they lead him to where there is a cop and he is arrested with the stolen money in his pockets. He tries to explain, but to no avail! This movie was interesting and I liked both the stories. Even though it was made for TV this movie is good and it is well worth watching. I will give it a 7/10.