Horror combines with noir motifs and a fast-moving plot in this tale of
four college students who run over a pedestrian while driving at night
in the Smoky Mountains. Finding a sheaf of hundred dollar bills and a
mysterious key in the pockets of the dead man's coat, their curiosity
is piqued and the friends follow clues to a bus station locker and a
homemade video depicting the rape and murder of a missing teenage girl.
In the hours that follow, the students find themselves under pressure
from both a private detective who claims to represent the father of the
missing girl and a state trooper who has connected them with the man
they left for dead on the fog-shrouded mountain. Suddenly, into their
nightmare of guilt and confusion, a shadowy underworld figure known as
the Pachyderm appears, vehemently demanding his money and video back.
Inexperienced young people battle both criminals and their own flawed
instincts in this disturbing lesson about greed, excess, and cultural
corruption.