Dir: Francis Galluppi | Cast: Jim Cummings, Faizon Love, Jocelin Donahue, Matt McVay, Richard Brake | US Crime thriller | 2023 90’
Last Stop in Yuma County is a sixties style Arizona-set hostage caper sizzling with ‘Western’ promise, a brilliant soundtrack and some killer lines like “hotter than the Devil’s dick’. But does it deliver? Well almost. It’s certainly fun along the way.
Jim Cummings plays an Awabi knife salesman running on empty who fetches up at a gas station on the way back to California. Two redneck dudes fresh from robbing a bank find themselves in same position. Both parties repair to the nearby diner waiting for the fuel truck to arrive. Predictably there’s a holdup by you know who, desperate to steal any car with petrol in its tank.
There’s nothing particularly original here but Yuma is not predictable either. In his feature debut Francis Galluppi plays a curve ball going down a different route than imagined – and with a dash of absurd humour. Guns are not the only weapons at play when push comes to shove in an enjoyable chamber piece that never quite makes it to the great saloon in the sky. Entertaining while it lasts, the final hilarious frame is a classic and puts the whole thing into context. @MeredithTaylor
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