Wow, Hitch-Hike is one rough movie.

Usually Franco Nero is the hero of a film, but in this, he’s nearly the villain from the beginning. He’s Walter Mancini, an alcoholic reporter on an RV vacation with his wife Eve (Corinne Cléry). Five minutes into the movie, he’s saying that he wishes that the wild game he shot and is barbecuing was his wife with a spit in her ass, drinking so much that he forgets his name and pretty much assaulting Eve while other campers can listen to his loud lovemaking moans.

The next morning, they get on the road and quickly pick up Adam Konitz (David Hess) and let me ask you, why would you ever pick up a hitchhiker that looks like David Hess? Within seconds, he’s asking Eve filthy questions and in the middle of a roadside fistfight with Walter. He pulls a gun on the couple and hijacks their vacation and makes them drive him to Mexico. Walter tries to outsmart him by writing SOS on his matchbook, but Adam gets the drop on both police officers, leaving their bodies bleeding on a desert highway.

On the way to the border, a truck attacks like something out of Duel. It’s Konitz’s partners, looking for the $2 million he stole from them. He ends up killing them, which exposes the fact that they only cared about the money and not sheer depravity, like Konitz, who then ties up Walter and makes him watch him assault Eve, who because this is an Italian movie ends up in bliss by the end of it. Walter and Konitz fight and a nude Eve emerges from their trailer with the killer’s rifle, blowing him away.

This is where any other movie would end, but for some reason, Walter keeps the killer’s body in the trailer and tells Eve they are keeping the money. After stopping for gas, four young motorcycle riders cover the road in oil and cause the Manicini car to crash. Is this where it ends? No, because after they steal $300 from Walter’s wallet, they have no idea how much money is in the backseat. Eve can barely move and can only watch while her husband pulls out Konitz’s body in the front seat and setting everything on fire.

He climbs up a hill and starts hitchhiking himself.

Based on The Violence and the Fury by Peter Kane, Franco Nero wanted to be in this movie because he had wanted to work with director Pasquale Festa Campanile. He was in Germany shooting 21 Hours at Munich with Hess when Companile asked him to be in the movie. Nero suggested that Hess come with him and be in this movie.

A few days before shooting, Nero hurt his hand punching an unruly horse on the set of Keoma. That’s why there’s a scene where he trips on the insurance man’s tent and breaks his arm.

This is set in California, but shooting there was too expensive. Instead, it was filmed in the mountains of the Gran Sasso in central Italy. To complete the film magic, American-like gas stations were built.

It’s also known as Death Drive and The Naked Prey, both of which are great titles. In the U.S., as you can already guess, it was released on video as Hitchhike: Last House on the Left.

Campanile was mostly known for his commedia sexy all’italiana, so I was shocked by how dark and hate-filled this movie is. Walter is an absolute loser, a man whose writing couldn’t pay the bills — ask a man about who he is and he will start with what he does for a living — and now he must work for Eve’s father. Feeling beat down, all he does is drink and abuse his wife. If anything, Eve has the least hope in this, as she keeps trying to believe in her husband even when he almost gets her killed.

What pushes it even further is the Ennio Morricone score, as well as the song “Sunshine,” which is first heard in a moment of fun as everyone drinks together at the camping area. By the end of the movie, each time that you hear it is filled with dread, like it keeps reminding you that things were bad at the start of this movie but they’ve somehow gotten even more bleak.

There are two alternate endings. There’s one in which the car explodes just as Walter and Eve reach for the money. The French ending has Walter and Eve laughing and leaving with the money after Konitz is shot.

I love this movie because it’s everything you expect when you see David Hess and the exact opposite of who Franco Nero usually is on film. It’s devoted to being a bad road trip the entire way with no hope and the only humor being as black as it can be.

You can watch this on YouTube.