Okay, so there's this trucker, right? And the trucker has a life of no-strings-attached sex in motel rooms, hard weeks on the road, drinking, and doing whatever the trucker wants. And then that trucker's life is thrown out of whack when a little boy shows up at the trucker's doorstep, needing to stay for a few weeks while the trucker's long-estranged ex is in the hospital for cancer treatment. Except, and here's where it gets really crazy: The trucker is a woman. What a twist, right?

Except, of course it isn't a twist, thoughTrucker's writer/director James Mottern seems to think it is. This is a Hollywood movie in indie film clothing (probably just meaning they didn't have the budget for a major release), and it hits all the beats you'd expect from a "moppet and workaholic learn something about life and each other" film. Even with the gender switch, it's barely different from movies like, say, The Rock's Game Plan, because all the men in the movie mope around talking about their feelings, taking care of the kid, and telling Michelle Monaghan (the trucker of the title) how amazing she is.

Don't get me wrong. Monaghan is relatively amazing to watch, at least when Mottern's clunker dialogue shuts off. In the first 10 minutes or so, the camera just focuses on Monaghan going about the day-to-day business of being a trucker, and it feels like the story could go anywhere. We could be watching 90 silent-ish minutes of Monaghan driving around the country; a pseudo-faux-documentary about truckers; or even a horror movie, a la Duel. Unfortunately, Mottern has far more banal things on his mind, and when Monaghan's 10-year-old son (Jimmy Bennett) shows up, the air blows out of the movie faster than a blown tire on an 18-wheeler.

There are some bright spots though, and they're all named Nathan Fillion. It's mind boggling that this man isn't a major movie star yet, because the few precious minutes he spends on screen are hilarious, touching, and utterly mesmerizing. Fillion's scenes with Bennett, in particular, feel natural, bordering on John Sayles-esque. And when Monaghan spends more than a few minutes bantering with Fillion, she seems to almost literally glow. He gets more mileage out of tossed-off dialogue about breakfast burritos and building fences than should be legally allowable. Fillion is a character actor trapped in a leading man's body, and he makes everyone around him look better.

But sadly, Fillion is not the trucker of the title, and there arepainfully long, predictable stretches of the film where he doesn't appear at all. Maybe in Trucker 2: Back on the Road, Fillion can be the star. Though I'm not holding my breath.



Put yer back in it, kid.