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Rest Stop tells the story of Nicole and Jess, who begin a cross-country road trip together from Texas to Hollywood. Their careless, open road adventure comes to a screeching halt as the journey takes a deadly turn at an out-of-the way rest stop.¹

Terrifying horror tale follows a pair of young lovers as they decide to leave their old lives behind and make a fresh start in Hollywood. After taking a break from their road trip at an abandoned rest stop, their fates are forever changed by a dangerous psychopath who loves torturing young attractive people.²

Except for a few minor things like a plot and characters. The fact is, “Rest Stop” is not so much a horror movie as it is a horror of a movie.³

The NJTPA study stems from the lack of adequate truck rest and service stops — especially near the port — currently available to truck drivers who are subject to new federal rules reducing drivers’ hours of service. As a result, truckers are often forced to pull over on streets or highway shoulders to rest.⁴

For every groan, though, Rest Stop has a sequence of impressive goriness, with director John Shiban (mainly a TV writer and producer) investing copious amounts of cash in buckets of blood and realistic effects, as the killer goes to work on people with staple guns and electric drills. It’s nasty stuff, and those looking for the red stuff won’t be disappointed.⁵

The movie starts off interesting when a couple make a detour at a rest stop, only to be split up when the female returns from the facilities to discover her boyfriend is missing. To make matters worse she discovers that an ominous yellow truck has apparently been stalking them since a dubious encounter they had while on the road.⁶