underestimated movie


Switchback is a underestimate movie - the plot is intelligent, Danny Glover is magnetic, the end is surprising.

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yeah.......but i figured out glover was the killer like 15 minutes in. The killer in the begining and glover use their knives the same way. the rest stop incident gave it away.......way early. maybe that was intended?????
but all in all a good movie. the way quaid and glover came together was cool. awesome climatic action scene, but glover died in a corny way.......i mean he should have just fallen on the cliff. impalement is a bit stale, but i guess he wasn't expecting that so that made it cool. the gross unexpected death.

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I guess it wasn't intent of director to do mystery about the murder identity. What i see of great in the movie are the climatic scenes and the narrative quality - which turn it a great entertaiment. The photography and locations are great too.


Edson,
Brazil

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I don't think they really intended to make a big "whodunit" mystery out of who the killer was.

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I agree that this movie is underestimated. Very good main cast and supporting characters. Sure you know Glover is probably the killer, but that is not uncommon in thrillers. Its not a mystery as much as an action thriller. It is entertaining without the need for excessive stunts. The pace and plots funnel well into the climax. It reminds me very much of Shoot to Kill (Deadly Pursuit) with Poitier and Berenger. Similar setting and pursuit from the perspective of the killer and pursuer.

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Good call on the Shoot to Kill comparison.

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Right. The identity of the killer was never in question after the first bar scene if you were paying attention.

There was some red herrings thrown about, but only for the oblivious. I think it was to be more a thriller suspense movie than mystery movie.

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I've never understood why this film didn't get more love. You'd think Stuart could have built a directing career out of this one - instead, it seems to have killed it for him. I think it was originally titled GOING WEST if I'm not mistaken and sat on the shelf for a while. Good Basil Poledouris score. What ever happened to him as well?

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I agree that it underestimated. I had a feeling after wathcing it for the 3rd or so time that it was a movie that intially was intended to be much darker and a lot bloodier. I have a feeling this is one that the execs got their hands on and chopped it up all nice and pretty. I watched "What Just Happened" one night before so my judgment may be clouded. I could totally picture this movie without the story book ending and 3 or 4 bloody kills (the movie just alludes to them) Still a fun movie to watch. Just felt like it could have gone a different way.

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Yeah, I really liked this movie too! I agree with what others said - I don't think the identity of the killer is supposed to be a big twist. You maybe should have some doubts or questions in the first half, but throughout the entire movie (ok...maybe not the first 20 minutes), I leaned toward the assumption that the killer is who he was.

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The only doubt I had about Glover being the killer was the fact it seemed "too obvious". Then, of course, Doc couldn't be either then... as he was who they were chasing, which demanded a different killer entirely, one who was in the film already who we would have had to rewatch and piece far off things together to try to make it fit. Other films have done this and I don't care for those types of twists. This movie was good. It was obvious, which caused doubt, then it was incredibly obvious, which allowed for me to just focus on the tension rather than trying to ask a lot of questions about what trick they (production) were trying to pull.

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I enjoyed it.

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Cool.

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Just gave it a rewatch. Great movie! 

What we got here is... failure to communicate!


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