In the plethora of horror subgenres out there today, one of the newer (and stranger) subjects is the “inanimate object comes to life and goes on a killing spree” fad. This started, mainly, with 2010’s Rubber, about a killer tire wreaking havoc, which has garnered divisive reviews but also managed to gain a cult following.

Sometimes, an overtly campy storyline in horror can work beautifully, but only if it’s clear that the intent is more for laughs and less for chills. Maximum Strollerdrive , written and directed by Evan Jacobs, feels as though it’s going for campiness, but never fully executes the mission enough to be clear, which makes for a problematic review.

First off, the title alone is brilliant and fun, and an obvious homage to Maximum Overdrive. That alone is enough to pull viewers in. Unfortunately, this is probably the strongest point of the entire movie. 

The film begins with an earthquake that rocks an unnamed city, and a father, known only as “The Man” (Mike Hartsfield) attempting to console his upset infant child. There are cases when a character doesn’t need to be named, but this isn’t one of them. In this instance, he’s the main protagonist and someone we are meant to root for and empathize with the entire time, and to only ever know him as “The Man”, when he could have easily been given a name, is confusing to say the least.

Regardless, The Man Decides to take his baby for a walk in their stroller, and thus begins the mayhem. It doesn’t take long before his poor innocent baby is inexplicably blown to smithereens inside the stroller. The practical effects during this scene serve their purpose in coming across as disturbing, and the crew did the best they could within their budget, but the impact is lost when the man seems more perplexed than traumatized at seeing his child’s remains strewn about the sidewalk. 

Shortly after this incident, the stroller seemingly comes to life and begins chasing him. This is the overall premise of the entire movie, which honestly could work if we only knew for sure that this was meant for comedy. Because this is so low budget, the message doesn’t quite come across, and the question of “is this supposed to be serious or is it supposed to be comedy” comes up far too often.

Much of that could be overlooked, to a point, if it wasn’t for the fact that this film has a run time of just under an hour, and the vast majority of it is spent on elongated scenes of the stroller chasing The Man, and him running away from it. There just isn’t any way to engage the audience enough when these scenes go on for far too long, and don’t further the plot in any way other than to show The Man running away from a stroller.

That also raises the question as to why he never asks for help from anyone, even though plenty of cars pass him as he runs through the streets. He travels so far that he could easily have run to a police station, even. Instead, he just runs, and runs, and runs, while the stroller slowly stalks him. Which, by the way, is joined by two other smaller strollers. All of which could easily be destroyed by The Man at any point in time, but he instead decides to just slowly run away from them…for a very long time. 

One of the biggest bright spots of the movie is the introduction of “The Veteran” (played by Jacbos), who briefly interacts with The Man while all of this is transpiring. The Veteran is a silly, but fun character, and gives the chance for camaraderie and interaction for The Man, but this too is wasted all too quickly.

When reviewing an indie film, consideration is always taken in for the budget that the creators had to work with. That can only go so far, though, and when there are glaring plot holes and missed opportunities in the script.

Maximum Stollerdrive is a fun concept that could have worked if it wasn’t bogged down by its misuse of plot development. It would have worked much better as a short film in the 20 minute range, where it could have cut down on all those chase scenes and given us more depth and understanding as to why all of this was happening in the first place.

                                                                                              2 Out Of 10