This very fun hunk of junk was horror writer extraordinaire Stephen King’s directorial debut. The film got spit on by every critic in the book upon its release and King hasn’t directed anything since. Well call me an a-hole (or an asshole) but I dug it.

First off, the premise of this film is way nifty. Having machines come to life to murder us without pity and turning us into tools for their own benefit is a good idea. Don’t get me wrong, you don’t watch this flick looking for an existential study of humanity’s relationship/dependency with machines, you watch it to see people get rammed by trucks (fun stuff!) and see shit blow up real good. The film definitely delivers on that front and I really didn’t need much else to be entertained.

I can think of two scenes that have been engraved in my mind ever since I first saw the flick back in 1986. The insane car pile up on the opening bridge in the beginning of the flick and the very violent soda machine attack on a group of kids playing baseball (you don’t see a soda machine whack people every day). Those two scenes kick some serious booty and for me to remember them after all of these years can only mean one thing: the scenes are the fucking money. Thanks King.

Now if you want to be a jerk-off, you can bitch and moan about the plot holes (like why do the trucks insist on circling the truckstop instead of staying still and saving gas...then again who said the trucks were smart?) but if you actually stop for a second and think: THIS IS A MOVIE ABOUT KILLER TRUCKS THAT DRIVE BY THEMSELVES AND SQUASH PEOPLE, then maybe you’ll do the smart thing and let that shit go! Where else can you see a kid riding his bike in an empty suburb filled with dead bodies (reminded me of "The Stand") and then eventually get chased by a lawnmower? Or a murderous truck with the face of the “Green Goblin” going ape shit? Or an electric kitchen knife slicing a poor waitress by itself? Nowhere else.

I do however, have some complaints about the film. First of all, the mid-section of the movie doesn’t fully live up to its slick set-up. It’s actually somewhat uneventful (but still watchable). Watching people wander in sewers or fill up trucks with gas for ten minutes aren’t the most exciting things in the world. On the flip side, the gas filling sequence had a kickass AC/DC song playing in the background ("Hells Bells"), which did help me digest it better. I also didn’t appreciate some of the characters. For instance, the horny bible salesman was very annoying and so was cigar-chomping Hendershot (Hingle). But the one character that I really couldn’t stand was Connie (Smith) whose high-pitched voice and constant complaining made my ears bleed. Man, did that broad get to me! I was praying for her to encounter a “Mack Truck” at a certain point but my prayers were never answered (damn!).

The film was based on the short story “Trucks” from King’s Night Shift.

“Trucks” was remade for TV in 1997.

The "Dixie Boy" truck stop set was built near Wilmington, North Carolina. It was so convincing that truckers would try to stop in. Eventually the producers had to put announcements in local papers saying that the "Dixie Boy" wasn’t a REAL truck stop, just a movie set.

Stephen King has a cameo in the opening of the film.

Did you spot the van with the AC/DC logo in the bridge carnage? Did you hear the guy say “Hells Bells” (an AC/DC song that also plays in the film)?

Yeardley Smith (Connie) does the voice of Lisa on "The Simpsons" (she annoys me there as well).