DVD Movie Rating for: Jeepers Creepers

2 out of 5

Movie Plot of: Jeepers Creepers

Siblings Darryl (Justin Long) and Trish (Gina Phillips) are on their way home from their freshmen year at college. But the trip starts turning dangerous as they see a man in a trench coat and a hat that covers his face dumping something down a pipe. They recognize him as the man who tried to run them off the road earlier and go see what he dumped after he leaves, but what they discover is too terrifying for them. They get help from a crazy woman who has too many cats (Eileen Brennan) and a psychic (Patricia Belcher) before they realize what's been chasing them is an ancient demon known as the Creeper (Jonathan Breck) who eats people to regenerate his parts and he sees something in one of them that he wants for his snack.

Siblings Darius - aka- Darry (Justin Long) and Patricia - aka -Trish (Gina Phillips) are on their way home from their freshmen year at college, When suddenly their trip starts to turn dangerous when they are nearly run off the road but a crazy driver. When they get going again they see a man in a trench coat and a hat that covers his face dumping something down a drain pipe. They then recognize him as the man who tried to run them off the road earlier and go see what he dumped after he leaves, but what they discover is too terrifying for them. They get help from a crazy woman who has too many cats (Eileen Brennan) and a psychic (Patricia Belcher) before they realize what's been chasing them is an ancient demon known as the Creeper (Jonathan Breck) who eats people to regenerate his parts and he sees something in one of them that he wants for his snack.

DVD Production Details of: Jeepers Creepers

Starring: Gina Philips, Justin Long

Director: Victor Salva

Format: Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen, Dolby

Studio: MGM/UA Video

DVD Release Date: January 8, 2002
DVD Features:
Commentary by director Victor Salva

Theatrical trailer(s)

Deleted and extended scenes including alternate opening and ending sequences

"Behind the Peepers" - a collection of 6 mini featurettes on the making of the film

Photo gallery

Full-screen and widescreen anamorphic formats

DVD Easter Eggs

Hidden clip: Select the "Scene Selection" option at the main menu. Highlight the option for chapters 1 to 4 at the bottom of the screen. Press Up to highlight the stitch that is between the scene selections. Press Enter to view a clip with Richard Matheson and the origins of Duel. Animated eye: Highlight the "Languages" option at the main menu. Press Left to highlight the rope, then press Enter. The eye of the character from the movie will move around on the right side of the screen. Featured scene: Select Victor Salva's entry in the cast and crew section. Press Up to highlight the stitch in the top right part of the screen. Press Enter to view the scene where he plays one of the bodies nailed to the Creeper'

Cast of the movie: Jeepers Creepers

• Gina Philips .... Patricia 'Trish' Jenner
• Justin Long .... Darius 'Darry' Jenner
• Jonathan Breck .... The Creeper/Bald Cop(uncredited)
• Patricia Belcher .... Jezelle Gay Hartman
• Eileen Brennan .... The Cat Lady
• Brandon Smith .... Sgt. David Tubbs
• Peggy Sheffield .... Waitress Beverly
• Jeffrey William Evans .... Restaurant Manager
• Patrick Cherry .... Binky Plutzker
• Jon Beshara .... Officer Robert Gideon
• Avis-Marie Barnes .... Officer Natasha Weston
• Steve Raulerson .... Cellblock Officer (as Steven Raulerson)
• Tom Tarantini .... Austin 'Roach' McCoy
• Will Hasenzahl .... Officer with Hole in Chest
• Kim Kahana .... Camper Driver

Photo Gallery of the movie: Jeepers Creepers

Click on one of the thumbnails to see the full size, high resolution photographs

Reviews of the movie: Jeepers Creepers

With confident style and low-budget ingenuity, Jeepers Creepers gets under your skin, provoking spine-tingling horror when college siblings Trish (Gina Philips) and Darry (Justin Long) encounter a flesh-eating demon along a barren rural highway. After a harrowing car chase that sets the movie's nerve-wracking tone, they investigate suspicious activity near an abandoned church, where a corrugated pipe leads to unimaginable horrors. What follows is a cat-and-mouse game against the regenerating demon, which feeds on fear--and selected body parts--according to a psychic (Patricia Belcher) who adds chilling portent to the routine climax in a besieged police station. Writer-director Victor Salva (Powder) emphasizes primal fear over logic, but plot holes are easily forgiven when you're scared out of your socks. A surprise box-office hit in late summer 2001, Jeepers Creepers will please even jaded horror fans with its back-to-basics frights.

Jeepers! Creepers.
What went wrong? The opening could hardly have been more promising. Bright sunlight, brother and sister driving along miles from anywhere, chatting about this and that (intelligent dialogue lays the groundwork for all sorts of relationship stuff, which will be completely forgotten as soon as the monster appears - which is a GOOD thing) ... it's well photographed (far more so than is usual for a horror film) and the first thrills of fear are expertly handled. For maybe as much as half an hour it even seemed possible that I was watching a masterpiece.

The first hint that I wasn't came when Darryl prepared to climb down the drain pipe. (The reason offered for their returning to the drain pipe in the first place wasn't convincing, but that didn't seem to matter at the time.) Trish grabs him and says angrily: "You know the bit in horror movies where someone does something really stupid, and everyone hates him for it? This is it." The LAST thing a story like this needs is self-awareness. Until now Salva had been making a real movie; now, suddenly, his characters know they're in a horror movie, and it's a "Scream" sequel.

Sure, it's a momentary lapse. (There's only one other moment of self-awareness, and it comes much later, when Darryl looks at what appears to be the monster's corpse and asks, "Is it dead?" and Trish responds, "They never are"; but by this point the film has taken so many wrong turnings that one more makes no difference.) But not TOO long afterwards, Salva, who started by avoiding all the usual, routine mistakes, lets us know he was merely saving them up. It's NOT a mistake, as some critics have said, to make the murderer Darryl and Trish see turn out to be a true monster (i.e., a supernatural being). In fact it would be a mistake not to. Nor is it necessarily a mistake to SHOW us the monster. The mistake was to show us the monster, AND make him look so cheesy, like a guy in a rubber mask on Halloween. Similarly, it wasn't a mistake to explain his nature and his powers; the mistake lay in offering an explanation AND making it so ordinary and silly. (Either way, it was a mistake to offer the explanation through the mouth The Character Who Knows Stuff - and has no other reason for appearing in the movie.) After a certain point, almost everything is a mistake.

The beginning is so good - so fresh - that I'm actually willing to forgive the stale, unexciting, obvious way it progresses and ends. If it had simply ended at the moment before it nosedives (when Darryl and Trish make it to the roadside diner), it would be a first-rate short film, and its conclusion would be if anything less abrupt and pointless.

P.S. and spoiler (sort of): We're told the monster comes out every 23 years. Why 23? I presume we're meant to think of insect species which swarm every 13, 17, or some highish prime number of years - but the reason they do this is so that their life cycle will be out of sync with that of any predator. What's the monster's excuse? He doesn't swarm (there's just one of him) and he can't be preyed upon.