Horror Movie Review: The Toll (2020)

A slow car-crash of a movie, The Toll starts off strongly, building tension and letting the imagination run wild. Then slowly but surely, it begins to veer off the path leading to a disappointing crunch and everyone around wondering what the hell happened.

Written and directed by Michael Nader (who shows some real talent here), The Toll is a minimalist film focusing on two characters (mostly). Cami (Jordan Hayes) and Spencer (Max Topplin), the former arrives in the city late at night and has to get to her father’s place. She orders a cab (Uber-style) and meets the driver who is the latter character.

Her father’s place is way out in the sticks, she is tired and Spencer is socially awkward so asking inappropriate questions and generally talking when he should just be quiet. Their drive is the best part of the movie as you’re left wondering if he is trouble or if you’re just being overly sensitive, like Cami is.

That is heightened when he takes a different route then she knows and insists it’s the sat-nav route. To be fair, he is more than reasonable here even offering her to direct him. She should have taken him up on his offer as they begin driving down a very dark, wooded dirt road and come to a stop when it looks like they hit someone.

Getting out of the car, there’s no-one around though so they go to head off but now the car won’t start. In the middle of nowhere, late at night and with a stranger… Cami decides to walk back to the main road but finds it closed with a sign pointing out a detour through the dark woods. Of course, she says “fuck that” and just continues past the signs only to find herself coming back down the dirt road to the car from the opposite way.

Fears and tensions are beginning to run high and that only gets worse when messages appear demanding that they must ‘pay the Toll Man’ and take the detour.

Toll Man is a supernatural horror with a twist. The Toll Man is real and he wants payment in blood. His appearances are often the worst parts of the movie as he doesn’t look great. Not very threatening at all. It’s when he’s attempting to manipulate the pair into delivering the blood that he wants that he really comes across frightening. There’s some clever mind-bending stuff that adds depth to the characters. Well, mainly Cami as the film reveals its twist finale ahead of time if you pay attention.

A twist that is certainly divisive and plot-hole ridden.

The two actors are great though and it’s nice to see them act like human beings when it comes to working together. Rosemary Dunsmore has a brief role, mainly to explain who the Toll Man is, but nails it too.

The locations, a car and the woods surrounding the dirt road really shouldn’t be that captivating but the way the film is shot really makes it feel enclosed and threatening. It’s about as scary as the film gets though, aside from the expected jump scares it never really gets any shivers going sadly.

It’s not a great horror movie and it’s not a terrible horror movie but there are way worse ways to spend 78 minutes.