Unfortunates learn that "there is no such thing as a free ride" in the Box Office International thriller HITCH HIKE TO HELL, on Blu-ray from Arrow Video.

Ever since his sister Judy ran away from home, dry cleaning delivery driver Howard (Robert Gribbin, TEEN LUST) has been the apple of his doting mother's (Dorothy Bennett) eye. Lately, however, he has been getting headaches and losing track of time, much to the consternation of his boss Mr. Baldwin (John Harmon, THE UNHOLY ROLLERS); however, Baldwin might be even more concerned that Howard's lateness is the result of picking up runaway hitchhikers and then snapping and murdering them when they fail to take into account what they must be doing to their mothers. While police Captain Shaw (GILLIGAN'S ISLAND's Russell Johnson) and Lieutenant Davis (Randy Echols) would prefer personal motives for the first few killings, two victims being strangled with wire coat hangers unfortunately suggests that Crescent City has its own serial psychopath.

Although released theatrically by Harry Novak's Box Office International, do not go in expecting something along the lines of A SCREAM IN THE STREETS; rather HITCH HIKE TO HELL is as offbeat as its theatrical co-feature KIDNAPPED COED (on Blu-ray from Severin Films with director Frederick R. Friedel's AXE) which also features a strong central performance of male character who elicits sympathy in a villainous roles. A combination of blunt and brutal violence and high school educational scare film with its apparently sincere social concerns about broken families, runaways, and the dangers of hitchhiking, the film is particularly reminiscent of the hitchhiking episodes of such shows as ADAM-12 and DRAGNET with Johnson particularly a bit Jack Webb-ish with observations like "It seems there are delinquent parents just as there are delinquent children" while Echols and his wife (Kippi Bell) debate bringing a child into such a violent world. The apparent sincerity and soberness of the subject matter clashes with the grindhouse production values – the locations are all too authentic while the bedroom of Davis and his wife looks like a hotel room – and pedestrian photography. Fortunately, the execution is effective elsewhere with the sexual nature of the crimes a surprise; and the fate of a gay hitchhiker (Don Lewis) means all bets are off when Howard picking up a twelve-year-old runaway (Sheryl Lynn) even at time where downbeat endings were the norm for exploitation films. Director Irvin Berwick is best known for his debut THE MONSTER OF PIEDRAS BLANCAS and his later Crown International release MALIBU HIGH (Cribbin would also star in DON'T GO NEAR THE PARK directed by the latter film's producer Lawrence D. Foldes).

Box Office International's double bill was repeated on VHS from Best Film & Video (as part of a series of Novak double features abbreviated to fit on the same tape) and then Image Entertainment's Something Weird Video DVD in fullscreen transfers. Like their disc of THE CHILD, Arrow Video's 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC Blu-ray comes with two aspect ratio choices: open-matte 1.33:1 and matted 1.78:1. The widescreen version is not ruinous since the film was projected matted, but the 1.33:1 version works just as well even if it reveals more hairs in the gate. The 35mm blow-up source is high in grain and skin tones are a bit pinkish but this may an effect of the film stock and processing since the red of the credits looks right. There is little damage but the possibilities of modern digital cleanup make the overall presentation less "grindhouse" than the DVD edition. The DTS-HD Master Audio 1.0 mono track is fine overall with some variability in the dialogue recording while the music track can be deliberately jarring and jangly. Optional English SDH subtitles are available for both transfers.

"Of Monsters and Morality: The Strange Cinema of Irvin Berwick" (29:01) is an appreciation by NIGHTMARE USA author Stephen Thrower who discusses Berwick's career in the industry – he worked uncredited in sound for Universal throughout the fifties – becoming friends with CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON's Jack Kevan which lead to Berwick directing THE MONSTER OF PIEDRAS BLANCAS, his subsequent films including a trio of lost melodramas of the sixties, a couple softcore features – and many more that are lost including a pair of hardcore ones according to son Wayne Berwick who would direct MICROWAVE MASSACRE (also available from Arrow) – his film for Southern Baptists about reborn go-go dancer Beverly Massegee who also claimed to be the "Babushka Lady" in the Zapruder film of the Kennedy assassination. "Road to Nowhere: Hitchhiking Culture Goes to Hell" (21:27) is a video essay by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas exploring the dark side of hitch-hiking in the real world and on the screen, tying the phenomenon to the concept of expanded road travel in the fifties and the road movie genre to historical western expansion as well as to the urban legend of the vanishing hitchhiker and letting loose of the libido with the car as a detachment from both traditional authority. She also discusses some of the films about the dangers of hitchhiking as well as the true crime cases involving hitchhiking around the time of the Berwick film. She does, however, make the bewildering remarks that HITCH HIKE TO HELL was the one of the "first" Box Office International releases and referring to THE HITCH HIKER's Frank Lovejoy and Edmund O'Brien as "young men."