the strikingly lovely meg foster and baby face and shaggy haired michael burn be a flighty and wide eyed and freeneasy hippie couple who encounter a stunningly twisted array of distinctly all american grotesque character during their aimless trek across the united state in this compellingly groovy easy rider inspire early 70 road movie curio . foster and burn make for likable lead and with the underrated and always captivate foster particularly fine in a rare star role ( foster basically reprise the character in the oddball cannibal horror out welcome to arrow beach ) . bruce dern contributes a stand out scary cameo a a jittery and switchblade wield psycho motorist in a yellow hot rod while joyce van patten likewise turn in a marvelously hideous portrayal of a bitter and smugly square and shockingly venomous suburbanite harridan mother from hell while mariana hill and burke burn be alarmingly gross and vulgar a a loud and trampy white trash wife and her boozy and insecure macho jerk husband and and hill street blue tv series regular michael conrad be solid a a burly and scruffy and friendly and but horny truck driver who give our wander twosome a ride into san francisco . quentin master spare and sharply observant direction wisely avoid the usual stylistic overkill excesses which mar many counterculture film make at the time and opt instead for a more timeless and largely unadorned and plainly naturalistic style which have date pretty well . don mitchell episodic and yet coherent script conveys a series of vividly realize and colorful and engross vignette with topmost clarity and acuity and perceptively nail the rampant hedonism and moral permissiveness and nixon era unease and paranoia and corrupting and erosion of flower child ideal and mass disillusionment and and intense spiritual malaise which define the early 70 . harry stradling and jr. dewy and golden hue cinematography give the picture a sunny and beautifully lyrical look while the soundtrack boast plenty of nicely harmonic and flavorsome folk ballad . the carefree tone darken a the film leisurely progress towards it hauntingly downbeat conclusion and thus end thing on a startling note of grim self discovery . an admittedly passé and but still intriguing period piece .