Entertainment

STICK IT OUT TILL END

STUART Gordon’s gorily amusing “Stuck” is essentially a B-movie with a single joke, albeit a pretty good – if admittedly sick – one.

Mena Suvari has her best role since “American Beauty” as Brandi, a self-centered nursing home employee distinctly lacking in sympathy for anyone.

This includes the newly unemployed and homeless Tom (Brit actor Stephen Rea of “The Crying Game”), whom she accidentally hits with her car on the way home from a night of drug-fueled partying.

Tom is impaled, bleeding, on the windshield.

But since there are no witnesses, the panicked Brandi drives the car into her garage instead of taking her victim to the hospital.

She locks the door and goes to work.

Returning sometime later, she’s infuriated to discover he’s still alive . . . and he’s been trying to summon help.

“Why are you doing this to me?” screams Brandi before whacking Tom over the head – and summoning a drug-dealer boyfriend (Russell Hornsby) to finish off the suffering man.

This is obviously not a movie for those lacking a taste for very black comedy.

But director Gordon – whose résumé includes the provocative David Mamet adaptation “Edmond” and cult horror films from the ’80s, like “Re-Animator” – cleverly plays with audience expectations.

“Stuck” is inspired by an actual case that occurred a few years ago in Fort Worth, Texas.

The driver there was sentenced to 50 years in prison, but Gordon’s movie – which is perhaps 10 minutes too long – has a much more satisfying outcome.

STUCKTabloid-worthy horror.Running time: 85 minutes. Rated R (violence, sex, profanity). At the Angelika, Houston and Mercer streets.