END OF THE ROAD

US, 2022, 89 minutes, Colour.

Queen Latifah, Chris Bridges (Ludicris) Mychaela Lee, Shaun Dixon, Beau Bridges, Frances Lee McCain.

Directed by Millicent Shelton.

As can be seen from the title, this is a road movie.

We are introduced to a family, the father having died, the mother having to take her two children on the road, cross-country, especially Arizona, to stay with her sister. A scene at the beginning, the two children are moody, the young boy with his computer games, the teenage girl listening to music, rather sullen, unwilling to move. There is also the mother’s brother, Reggie, something of a ne’er-do-well, unreliable. The mother is played by Queen Latifah, Reggie by Chris Bridges (Ludicris).

The early part of the drama is getting everyone to talk to one another. Some progress and they stay for a night at a motel. However, the hear a shot, and a man is killed in the adjacent unit, Render trying to help with her training as a nurse. They are interrogated by the police and move on.

However, the audience has been introduced to a sequence, a drug dealer from the cartels flying in on a helicopter, a bag of money, and one of the recipients shooting the other. The audience sees that the dead man is the one who did the shooting at the helicopter.

However, the chief of police, Beau Bridges, declares his determination to capture the mastermind whom he has been pursuing for a long time.

The family stop at a Wild West Theme Park, enjoying it, but receiving phone calls from a mysterious voice about the bag of money that had been in the motel (and which Reggie had taken, a guarantee for the family). Then the action starts, the young boy is abducted, Brenda has hidden the money at a motel and returns to get it, sees that one of the cleaners has taken it, pursues her, gets tangled with a supremacist group but turns the tables, still with the mysterious phone calls. The police chief has rescued Reggie and the daughter.

Then, of course the revelation, the twist, and the violent confrontation between the family and the killer.

It ends well for the family – and, a moral issue, while most of the money was seen to be burnt up in a car and flames, Reggie has pocketed some of the money.

1. A road movie? The dramatic end of the road?
2. New Mexico settings, homes, moving home, the desert countryside, the motel, the police questioning, the wild West setting, the sheriff’s house? The musical score?
3. The situation, Brenda, widow, the two children, self-centred, petulant, the move? The drive, no conversation, commanding them to speak and listen?
4. Reggie, his background, unreliable, drugs, confidential conversations with Kelly? Relationship with Brenda, his place in the car?
5. The sequence with the helicopter, the rendezvous with the men, drugs, cartels, the bag of money, the accomplice shooting the other?
6. The motel, the rooms, hearing the shot? The dead man? Brenda using her nursing skills? His death, the police, the interrogations? Brenda in the family moving out, the phone calls from Hammers, his authority, coming to meet them? The man the accomplice with the helicopter?
7. Reggie, seeing the bag of money, taking it, naïvely hoping that it will solve the family future?
8. Going to the wild West show, the various personalities, the saloons, the prison, the youngsters enjoying it, the high noon?
9. Hammers, his authority, the other police, the interrogations, the name of the arch criminal, his alleged search for him?
10. The film turning violent, the abduction of the sn and internment? Brenda, concern, the phone calls, the hiding the money in the motel, the irony of the worker taking it, Brenda seeing her, pursuing her in the car, the crash, the American patriot group, holding Brenda, her turning the tables, the gun, the shot, her getting away, desperate?
11. Reaching Kelly, taken, the house? Hammers and his wife, tough stances? The revelation of the truth? The phone calls?
12. The escape, Brenda and the crash, trying to get to the house, the family United, Hammers and his pursuit, confronting them, the shooting?
13. Hammers and his wife, violent, the tables turned, the shootings, the fire? Death?
14. The family that is threatened together stays together – the motel scene, the audience having seen the bag of money go up in fire, yet Reggie keeping some of it…?