The true story of a celebrity animal trainer who picks up a hitchhiker, only to discover his passenger is a serial killer. A film by Jeffrey Darling, starring Jacob Elordi, Zachary Quinto, and Patrick J. Adams.

During his trip, Jim’s Carryall breaks down. He stops at a mechanic shop to get it fixed. The mechanic (Christopher Guyton) informs Jim that fixing the car properly would take several days, but Jim is on a tight schedule. Fortunately, the mechanic is able to patch the car up within an hour, though he warns Jim that it will still need a complete overhaul as soon as possible.

While Jim (Zachary Quinto) is on the phone with his wife, discussing his plan to visit her brother Saul to collect a debt, he gets distracted by a young man hitchhiking on the side of the road. Overhearing that the young man, Bobby (Jacob Elordi), is trying to get back to Michigan, Jim decides to offer him a ride as far as Chicago.

Suspicious of Jim’s constant questioning, Bobby grows agitated. However, the atmosphere shifts when Bobby learns that Jim is Spanky’s handler, a celebrity chimpanzee. Claiming to be a huge fan, Bobby boasts about watching every show Spanky ever appeared on. Offering his help, Bobby suggests they drive straight to Albuquerque where Jim plans to rest for the night.

At night, Bobby shows Jim a gun he found in a car parked in front of the motel. Because he thinks Jim called the police while talking to the manager, Bobby threatens to kill him. However, Bobby has a sudden change of heart. He takes Jim’s ring and wallet, then threatens to shoot Spanky if he ever sees a police car nearby.

Interestingly, although the film is based on a true encounter of animal trainer Dave Pitts encountering teenage serial killer Larry Ranes in 1964, the filmmaker keeps the killer’s identity a mystery from the animal trainer. While viewers receive flashbacks and glimpses of Bobby’s victims, Bobby never tells Jim that he killed people. This leaves viewers wondering why Jim never attempted to flee when he had multiple chances to do so. In real events, Larry threatened Dave with a gun and revealed his history of killing people during their journey together. Larry even confessed to Pitts that he had been killing people who stopped to give him a ride, which explains why Dave never tried to flee due to his fear that Larry would come after him and Spanky.

While Zachary Quinto is undeniably a brilliant actor, casting him as an animal trainer might not have been the most effective choice. At times, his charisma unintentionally overshadows Bobby’s character, creating a sense of hidden danger despite Jim’s seemingly good intentions. This creates an undercurrent of tension that ultimately fizzles out, as Jim’s menacing aura isn’t followed by any real action.

Patrick J. Adams’s brief appearance as Jim’s brother-in-law Saul is a welcome surprise. While the screenwriter likely intended this scene not happened in the real events to build tension with their interaction, it disrupts the flow of the main narrative and ultimately adds nothing to the story. The film later reveals that Saul is not harmed by Bobby.

Directed by Australian filmmaker Jeffrey Darling in his directorial debut, HE WENT THAT WAY follows a suspenseful road trip of three unlikely characters: a celebrity animal handler, his chimpanzee, and a hitchhiking teenage killer. The film is only 95 minutes long, yet it suffers from slow pacing and a weird dynamic chemistry that leads nowhere. The script was written by Evan M. Wiener, whose writing skill is still questionable, based on American author Conrad Hilberry’s 1987 non-fiction book Luke Karamazov.

“Luke Karamazov” by Conrad Hilberry is a true-crime account of two brothers, Luke Karamazov and Tommy Searl, convicted of serial murders. Based on real-life events and interviews with those involved, the book offers a vivid and detailed portrait of the brothers and their crimes. Larry Ranes and Danny Ranes were American serial killer brothers who committed their crime sprees predominantly in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Their case is notable for the fact that, unlike other siblings who engage in crime, they operated completely independently of one another.

I like the final twist when the film reveals that Spanky, the seemingly ordinary chimpanzee mostly seen in the background, is the one who narrates the entire story. In the film, Spanky isn’t a real chimpanzee but is portrayed by Phoenix Notary in a chimpanzee suit with the help of special effects. Phoenix Notary also makes a separate appearance as a girl smoking a cigarette.

HE WENT THAT WAY premiered at the Tribeca Festival on 9 June 2023. The film had its limited theatrical release in the United States on 5 January 2024, by Vertical.

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