I wouldn’t say that horror cinema was in the doldrums around the turn of the century. There was a strong direct-to-video market, independent movie makers were still churning out flicks shot on VHS, and there had been a revival of the teen slasher flick in theaters. But, there was a hangover from the golden age that was the 1980s. It felt like everything that could be achieved in the genre had now been done. There was nowhere left to go with gore, monsters, killers, ghosts, scares, etc. Horror had been stripmined and there were only a few original ideas on the horizon (not true, fortunately).
Into that void stepped writer/director Victor Salva, with Jeepers Creepers. Received with only lukewarm praise upon release, distance has done much to improve this movie. At first blush it was little more than Texas Chainsaw with a truck, but the intervening two decades of horror have aged this movie, if not like a fine wine, then like a good cheese. It’s a horror story boiled down to bare essentials, by budgetary necessity, as it turns out, and with a villain that doesn’t fit into the typical standards of horror monsters.
Gina Philips and Justin Long, who have great chemistry together, star as Trish and Darry, college-aged siblings who are on a road trip back home for break. They decide to take the scenic route through the middle of nowhere, and that is a poor decision. But, that is not the dumb decision hinted at in the headline above. Oh, no.
The two lane blacktop is rolling by, brother and sister banter with each other, and through the back window of the car viewers can see a dark vehicle approaching. When it nears the rear bumper of the car, a horn that could wake the dead blasts, and I had the 
same shocked reaction as the characters. Whoever is behind the wheel of the truck wants to get past the young travelers in a big way, and scares the bejesus out of them doing so.
The truck rolls by, and later the siblings near an abandoned church and there is the truck in the yard. They can see a tall figure in grimy duster and wide brim hat, unloading objects wrapped in bloody white sheets that are clearly bodies, and dumping them down a large drainpipe. This is The Creeper (Jonathan Breck), and he notices he’s being watched.
After running the siblings off the road one more time, The Creeper is on his way somewhere, and it is then that the dumbest decision in horror history is made. Darry gets it in his head that there could be people to rescue at the bottom of that pipe. As he sees it, they have a moral obligation to go back and save anyone surviving down there. Never mind that they have twice now had a run-in with what they believe to be a killer, never mind that they have no idea if or when The Creeper will return to the abandoned church, and never mind that they have no idea what’s at the bottom of that pipe. Darry, in a rather flippant manner, places himself and his sister in mortal jeopardy by deciding to ride to the rescue of unknown people in an unknown state of duress.
Bad decisions by characters are what make many horror movies happen, and Darry’s decision might be the worst of them all. I certainly can’t recall a dumber one. The good news is, his poor decision making is not the result of poor writing. It feels like something Darry would actually do, making it all the more exasperating for the viewer when he follows through. It’s a tense story moment, and handled very well by Salva and Long, who gave a very strong performance in this movie.
Things don’t work out as planned, if Darry really had a plan at all. The Creeper returns. The number of players expands, to include psychic and exposition factory Jezelle (Patricia Belcher), and the entire town police force.
Audiences learn that The Creeper only appears every 23rd spring to capture and feed on unwary travelers, like a vampiric cicada. It takes a big whiff of potential victims and appraises the quality of their parts before digging in. As The Creeper, Breck is covered head to toe in makeup and rubber body suit, becoming something akin to a gargoyle, wings included. The look is a little familiar and gimmicky, but there are also moments when the face effects are ghastly. The Creeper is a fine addition to the long list of horror movie creatures.
After viewers are thrown a nice amount of fodder, it’s on to the final act, which was rewritten completely by Salva after he had his budget slashed during shooting. This final act is what let a lot of critics and theatergoers down back in 2001, but I found the transition into the last act just fine. It got more cartoony, but there were still some genuine frights to be had, and Salva gave us exactly the ending this movie needed.
The more years go by, the more Jeepers Creepers feels like a classic of its day. It’s small scale horror done well, with swiftness, and with much credit to Salva, who was forced by circumstances beyond his control to make a movie divergent from his original vision.