Horrors Elsewhere is a recurring column that spotlights a variety of movies from all around the globe, particularly those not from the United States. Fears may not be universal, but one thing is for sure — a scream is understood, always and everywhere.
Lodewijk Crijns‘ Tailgate starts out in the remote, Dutch countryside. In this dreadful yet scenic cold open, a terrified bicyclist flees a deceptively genteel man known only as Ed (Willem de Wolf). The daunting stranger runs the panicked cyclist off the road with his white, nondescript Volkswagen Caddy before proceeding to shove the business end of a pressurized sprayer into the victim’s mouth. Clad in exterminator gear, Ed finally dispenses a direct dose of chemical discipline for reasons unknown.
The remainder of Tailgate focuses on Hans (Jeroen Spitzenberger) and his family as they make their way to see the grandparents. The stress of the trip irks Hans before they even leave; he ignores his mother’s phone calls that morning and constantly snaps at wife Diana (Anniek Pheifer) and their two young daughters, Milou (Roosmarijn van der Hoek) and Robine (Liz Vergeer). Once they hit the road, everything from the flow of traffic to the children arguing over tablet time cranks up the tension. The audience is now trapped in this Volvo with a temperamental father, a passive-aggressive mother, and two spoiled brats.
Hans does not help matters with the way he drives; he makes up for time by speeding like a bat out of hell. So when he comes across another driver going too slow for his liking, Hans blares his horn, tailgates, and makes a rude gesture toward the other motorist once they make eye contact. Unfortunately for him and his kin, the offended party is none other than Ed the exterminator. The grandfatherly killer catches up with Hans at a gas station and demands an apology. Staying true to form, Hans refuses and goes on his way, none the wiser of the fate in store for him and his family.
The Netherlands has gone to great lengths to deter traffic accidents and decrease fatalities over the years. The country’s roads, which are otherwise ranked as some of the safest in the world, are suddenly a vehicular hellscape marred by aggressive, anarchic drivers. Crijns undermines the government’s “Sustainable Safety” act with his movie; his characters wantonly disregard traffic laws or use violence to enforce them. This sort of opposition to the system is why Tailgate is one of the more subversive examples of “Nether-Horror.”
Road-trip horror movies often occur in broad daylight. This choice toys with the preconception of bad things only happening at night or in isolation. Fellow road ragers The Hitcher and Joy Ride negotiate day and night settings, but Tailgate fully takes place when the sun is out. Cinematographer Bert Pot resists the expected iconography of the subgenre — dusty, lonely stretches of pavement and gravel along with a series of dingy roadside stops — and finds terror in everydayness. The routes and gas stations are clean, and the neighborhoods are picturesque. Ed’s evil is not obscured by nightfall or restricted to outlying locations; he can easily murder someone in their own house or in an open, empty field.
Both leading, male characters are cut from the same cloth in spite of a generational gap; they are pathologically cocksure and unable to admit to their mistakes. Hans is stubborn to a fault and has no foresight when it comes to his immature actions. Meanwhile, someone as self-important as Ed is equally unyielding, yet he obviously takes things much further than the average egotist. So although their exteriors and methods are worlds apart, Hans and Ed operate on the same wavelength, albeit at different ends.
As much as he screams and pushes people’s buttons, Hans is still vulnerable to the same fears as everyone else. He has simply found a way to mask those insecurities. In his case, Hans’ more contemptible behavior flares whenever his parents are a factor; he becomes more irritated with every mention of them. There is an unspoken strain to their relationship that Crijns hints at rather than spells out, but it is apparent Hans has some anxiety concerning his father. As Oma Trudy (Truus te Selle) states so bluntly on the phone, this could very well be Opa Joop’s (Hubert Fermin) last birthday. Dodging his mother’s calls, scolding Diana for waking up late, driving recklessly to make it in time to see his father — there is more to the story when understanding why Hans is so detestable.
Before all hell breaks loose and Ed whips out the poison again, Hans is given one last opportunity to apologize. Hans instead doubles down, not knowing what kind of person he is dealing with. This is of course after Diana pleads with her husband to do the one thing that will end this problem; she even promises not to tell anyone. So it is clear Ed is not only a threat to Hans’ physical wellbeing but also, and above all, his pride. With an apology, people have to sacrifice a bit of themselves and show their vulnerability. However, Hans does not want anyone to see how frightened he really is; whether it be of a murderer, or the mortality he is reminded of whenever his father’s dotage is brought up.
Stock horror villains who hide behind masks do not instill as much fear as they used to. Ed, on the other hand, looks like he should be gardening rather than spraying random people with vesicant poison — it is that innocuous veneer that makes his misdeeds all the more unsettling. Ed’s identity is no secret, and viewers have a decent grasp of his personality before he succumbs to his baser instincts. Ed feels emboldened by the absoluteness of the law when dealing with those he marks unruly, and a holier-than-thou attitude spurs him to tell children they are eating carcinogenic hamburgers. On top of that, he looks to the parents when casting blame for their progenies’ insubordination; Oma for Hans’ disobedience and Diana for her general permissiveness with her daughters. There are layers to this very unusual and meticulous antagonist.
Tailgate will fail to elicit sympathy from those demanding compassionate characters in bad situations, but the intensity of the chases, the inherent moral questions, and credible hostility all help prolong this thriller’s tread life.
