Night of the Hunted is a 2023 American-French horror-thriller film directed by Franck Khalfoun from an original screenplay by Rubén Ávila Calvo and David R.L.
When an unsuspecting woman stops at a remote gas station in the dead of night, she's made the plaything of a sociopath sniper with a secret vendetta. To survive she must not only dodge his bullets and fight for her life, but also figure out who wants her dead and why.
Plot[]
Alice is a VP in marketing for a pharmaceutical company who has stopped by in a motel with her colleague and lover, John. Her unsuspecting husband Erik wants her to hurry back home so they can go to a fertility doctor to try and have a baby and so she sets off with John at 2 a.m. to make it in-time. While on the road, John notices the fuel light is on and they stop off at a gas station. While inside, Alice goes to get a coffee for the journey and notices there's no one around and that there's blood splatter on the walls. She tries to leave in a hurry but is shot in the arm and falls to the floor in pain.
Meanwhile, John is in the car, unaware of what's going on with the music turned up. Alice writhes in pain and tries to get her cellphone from the floor but the sniper shoots it just before she can get to it. She scrambles and hides while calling for John but he can't hear her. John notices the fuel light is on again and sees that the tank underneath the car has been severed, therefore leaking oil. He goes inside the store to find Alice but is instantly shot in the neck and falls to the floor. Alice freezes in a panic and watches as the shooter kills him with a bullet to the head.
She manages to get a hold of a two-way radio on the counter after hearing someone calling out asking for "Amelia" on it. She contacts the man on the other side and asks him to call for help. He calls the police while on the line but then soon reveals it's an act and that he is the one who is shooting at her from the billboard across the street. They converse on the radio and he tells her he knows about her affair and her profession, that she is "poisoning" society by marketing pharmaceuticals and is also tired of the modern "woke" world, from women accusing men of harassment to vaccinations and "fake news".
Alice tries to make a run for it multiple times but is shot at and narrowly misses them every time. She manages to make it behind the counter where she finds the dead store worker, Amelia. The sniper tells her that Amelia was his wife who was having an affair and thus, he killed her. Moments later, a man pulls up in a car and walks in inside the convenience store. He calls out Amelia's name and Alice tells him to watch out for the sniper. He finds Amelia's body and mourns her but Alice has the realisation that the shooting seemed to have stopped when he entered. The man swears he isn't the sniper and Alice tells him to go to get his phone from the car and call the police to prove it. He wants to help her and so goes to his vehicle to get his phone but just as he makes it inside, is shot in the head.
Running out of hope, Alice quickly tries to come up with a way of escape. While the sniper is distracted on the radio, ranting about society, Alice uses umbrellas to shield the view of the store and creates a path of escape. The sniper shoots at her but she manages to get outside. She almost makes it to the car but is shot at several times and is forced to run back inside. Angry and worn down, Alice yells at the sniper, telling him that she cheated on her husband because she is angry at herself and that she doesn't want to give birth to a child in a world with people like him.
An elderly couple then pull up to the gas station and she tries to signal at the man to leave but he is suddenly shot down by the sniper. His wife gets out to check on him and suffers the same fate. Alice notices a young girl in the car and begs the sniper not to hurt her, even willing to sacrifice herself for the little girl. The sniper gives her the opportunity to save the girl and she manages to get the girl into the store and hidden in a safe place located in the garage..
Alice taunts the sniper to come face her and he obliges. The hooded man enters the store in a ski mask and a hand-gun, he searches for her, telling her he could be a typical lunatic shooter, or maybe hired by her husband or even a disgruntled employee. Suddenly, he is ambushed by Alice, who impales him using a metal rod and stabs him in the back. He fights her off and slams her into the glass refrigerator. Crawling on the floor, he shoots her and goes into the garage to search for the little girl.
He manages to find her and tells her there's nothing to worry about. Alice appears behind him and hits him over the head with a fire extinguisher multiple times. She hits the button on the garage door to lower it and drags his body directly underneath. She tries to take his ski mask off but the shooter resists and eventually his head is crushed under the garage door as the young girl watches. Alice succumbs to her wounds and dies as the little girl walks out of the store and down the road, alone.
List of deaths[]
| Name | Cause of Death | Killer | On Screen | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Amelia | Shot in the back | The Sniper | No | |
| John | Gunshot to the head | The Sniper | Yes | |
| Doug | Gunshot to the head | The Sniper | Yes | |
| Eleanor | Gunshot wound | The Sniper | Yes | |
| Bob | Multiple gunshot wounds | The Sniper | Yes | |
| The Sniper | Head crushed on a garage door | Alice | Yes | |
| Alice | Gunshot wound | The Sniper | Yes | Killed by the injury later |
Cast[]
- Camille Rowe as Alice
- Stasa Stanic as Sniper
- Jeremy Scippio as John
- J. John Bieler as Doug
- Monaia Abdelrahim as Cindy
- Brenda Nunez as Amelia
- Brian Breiter as Bob
- Aleksander Popovic as Erik
- Isaiah Reyes as Eddie
Gallery[]
