Vehicle 19 – review

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Newly released American convict Michael Woods (Paul Walker) breaks parole, flees to Johannesburg to make things up with his girlfriend, is given the key to the wrong car at the airport, discovers a gun under his seat and a kidnapped girl trussed in the boot, and finds himself caught up in a political conspiracy involving top South African lawmen and driving for his life. We've had thrillers in which the protagonist is confined to a lifeboat, a coffin, a metal cube and a phone box. The clever gimmick determinedly pursued in Vehicle 19 is that the camera never leaves the car, though Woods does so briefly. At first it's intriguing, then annoying, and finally it gives us the urge to get out and walk.