Move Over, Jason & Freddy, There’s a New Monster in Town: The Bolt!
Imagine a horror film starring the popular EV as a vicious vehicle intent on wreaking havoc on unsuspecting victims. Hey, it could happen.
Believe it or not, a horror film starring a possessed electric vehicle terrorizing a town is not too bizarre of a concept for Hollywood to consider. In fact, similar films with the same premise have already become cult hits, including the Eighties-era Stephen King-adapted movies Maximum Overdrive and Christine.
The horror movie concept starring an EV like the Bolt, however, comes from the creative mind of musician and monster-movie fan Kirk Hammett, the guitarist in Metallica.
In a recent post on his horror film-focused blog, Fear Fest Evil, the hit-making heavy metal guitarist hits up the topic of “haunted and menacing vehicles” and recounts his favorite car-related horror films.
On his list are the aforementioned flicks, along with The Car and The Hearse — same mow-em-down plot with different makes of vehicles. (He apparently also loves a film titled Rubber, about a menacing evil tire with a fear-inducing personality of its own. Wait. What?!? Someone call Mr. Goodwrench!)
Hammett is a longtime horror film fanatic who has authored a book on scary movies, Too Much Horror Business. Also, his vast guitar collection includes many that are customized with the images of famous monsters. In his latest Fear Fest Evil blog entry, he recalls the incident that first put the fear of four wheels in him.
“I still remember first seeing Duel — man, what a scary film! …The whole concept was scary,” writes Hammett about the Steven Spielberg-directed 1971 TV movie. “You’re driving down the road in a relatively quiet, safe place when all of a sudden, out of the blue, there’s this menacing force which happens to be in a tractor trailer that not only spots you but starts tracking you at high speeds! That is scary, man!”
Being chased by a demon tractor trailer is scary?!? Hmmm…sounds about as frightening as watching old reruns of Friends. But we’ll take his word for it.
“Why hasn’t there been a movie about haunted conversion vans?” he ponders in prose. “Haunted campers? Haunted tour busses? Think about that one!”
Out of all of his favorite monster movies and demon vehicles, the car-obsessed rocker, who owns a fleet of exotic rides, counts the 1964 Chevy Malibu as one of his most memorable big-screen stars.
‘What about [a horror film with] electric cars? You’d never hear them coming. How about the potential for electric vehicles to cause mayhem? They could turn into mobile electric chairs!’
“I must give an honorable mention to one of my favorite films, Repo Man, and that 1964 Chevy Malibu,” he says. “THAT was a car with some sort of conscious entity, too, [and] cool enough to mention as it was one of the finest movies of 1984 which deserved an Oscar!”
An Oscar for an Emelio Estevez movie that’s not The Breakfast Club?!? THAT is a scary concept.
However, hard-rockin’ Hammett has a scarier idea for a car-starring fright fest. And considering that he mentions it right after crowing about Repo Man‘s classic Chevy (pictured), we surmise that he’d probably cast a Bolt.
“What about [a horror film with] electric cars?” he suggests. “You’d never hear them coming, so how about the potential for electric vehicles to cause mayhem? They could shoot lightning bolts out, they could turn into mobile electric chairs!”
“OK, I’m going to call my agent because I see a genre developing that could be pretty fun.”
He’s kidding, of course, but we’d actually pay money to see that one!
