A different kind of American independent horror film, the hypnotic TOAD ROAD, presented by Elijah Wood and his SpectreVision production company, unfolds like a hallucinatory cross between the sexual candor of Larry Clark and Harmony Korine, and the backwoods creep-out of The Blair Witch Project. Young James kills time with his small town druggie friends, engaging in excessive chemical intake, until he meets sweet new arrival Sara. But just as James wants to abandon the narcotics life, Sara wants him to take her further into mind-altering experimentation and she also wants him to introduce her to the sinister local legend of Toad Road, a spot deep in the forest that is apparently home to the Seven Gates of Hell. Writer-director Jason Banker's debut is a unique fusion of documentary-like realism and otherworldly, haunting rural terror. Unlike any other film you'll see this year, TOAD ROAD is a mesmerizing trip.
