The Last Stop in Yuma County

The Last Stop in Yuma County
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Francis Galluppi
Written by	Francis Galluppi
Produced by	Matt O'Neill Atif Malik Francis Galluppi
Starring	Jim Cummings Jocelin Donahue Sierra McCormick Nicholas Logan Michael Abbott Jr. Connor Paolo Alex Essoe Robin Bartlett Jon Proudstar Sam Huntington Ryan Masson Barbara Crampton Gene Jones Faizon Love Richard Brake
Cinematography	Mac Fisken
Edited by	Francis Galluppi
Music by	Matthew Compton
Production companies	Local Boogeyman XYZ Films Carte Blanche Random Lane
Distributed by	Well Go USA Entertainment
Release dates	September 23, 2023 (2023-09-23) (Fantastic Fest) May 10, 2024 (2024-05-10) (United States)
Running time	90 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$1 million
Box office	$94,344

The Last Stop in Yuma County is a 2023 American crime thriller film written and directed by Francis Galluppi in his feature directorial debut. It stars Jim Cummings, Jocelin Donahue, Richard Brake, Faizon Love, and Michael Abbott Jr.

The Last Stop in Yuma County premiered at Fantastic Fest on September 23, 2023. The film was released in the United States in select theaters and on digital platforms on May 10, 2024, by Well Go USA Entertainment.

Plot

At a remote desert location in Yuma County, Arizona, in the 1970s, a traveling knives salesman stops at a filling station. Vernon, the station and motel attendant, informs him that the station's pumps are dry, and there are no other filling stations for over 100 miles (160 km), but that a refueling truck is expected to arrive soon. On the radio, the salesman hears about a bank robbery earlier that morning in Buckeye, where the robbers fled with approximately $700,000 in a green Ford Pinto with a damaged rear end. Charlotte, a waitress at the nearby diner, is dropped off by her husband Charlie, who is the local sheriff; she opens the diner and welcomes the salesman in. In conversation with Charlotte, he mentions that he is on his way to Carlsbad, California, for his daughter Sarah's birthday.

Shortly afterwards, the two bank robbers, Travis and Beau, pass the wreck of a refueling truck and arrive in a green Pinto, which the salesman recognizes as matching the description of the getaway car in the Buckeye robbery. He communicates his suspicions to Charlotte, who tries to phone her husband at the police station, but Beau forestalls her and cuts the phone cord before Charlotte can say a word to the sheriff. The robbers force her and the salesman at gunpoint to continue behaving normally—until the refueling truck arrives, or somebody else with enough fuel in their car stops by. Unbeknownst to everybody in the diner, the truck will never arrive because it has run off the road and lies overturned several miles away.

Charlie has his deputy, Gavin, come by the diner to pick up coffee for the police station and Charlotte tries to slip a plea for help to him on a coffee lid, but the coffee is spilled with the lid unseen when Gavin bumps into Travis. Meanwhile, joining the salesman and Charlotte in the diner are an elderly couple from Texas, a pair of young aspiring criminals named Miles and Sybil, and local rancher Pete. With the fuel tank of Pete's vehicle being almost full, Beau and Travis try to force him into giving his car keys to them, but with almost everybody in the diner carrying a firearm, a Mexican standoff develops and Pete tries to negotiate for some arrangement out of that impasse. However, Charlotte stabs Beau with a knife, which sparks a shootout in which everybody gets killed except for the salesman and Sybil. In the course of attempting to take the bank robbers’ money, Sybil tries to shoot the salesman - but is stabbed in self-defense by the salesman first.

The salesman decides to take the robbers' loot from the Pinto's trunk and syphons some fuel from Pete's truck. Upon leaving he is interrupted by a young couple with a baby who arrive on the scene. In the ensuing scuffle, the salesman ends up killing them both and, unbeknownst to him, shooting his gas tank. The salesman leaves the crying baby in the couple’s car, and drives off - with a trail of spilled gas behind him. The sheriff and deputy arrive and discover the carnage. Seeking vengeance for his wife’s murder, the sheriff tracks the fleeing salesman, whose car has run out of gasoline near the wreck of the refueling truck. The sheriff is unbelieving of the salesman’s claims of innocence and in his rage, chases after him to shoot him. In the confrontation, the salesman is shot in the gut by the sheriff as he lures the sheriff closer to the crashed fuel truck, lights the gas trail on fire, and causes a huge explosion - killing the sheriff. With the robbers' money blowing away in the background, the salesman staggers into the desert to slowly fall and die in the sand.

Cast

• Jim Cummings as the knife salesman
• Jocelin Donahue as Charlotte
• Sierra McCormick as Sybil
• Nicholas Logan as Travis
• Michael Abbott Jr. as Charlie
• Connor Paolo as Gavin
• Alex Essoe as Sarah
• Robin Bartlett as Earline
• Jon Proudstar as Pete
• Sam Huntington as David
• Ryan Masson as Miles
• Barbara Crampton as Virginia
• Gene Jones as Robert
• Faizon Love as Vernon
• Richard Brake as Beau
• Robert Broski as a truck driver

Production

The film was a passion project for Francis Galluppi who spent years trying to get it made. After a deal with a production company didn't pan out due to differing visions between Galluppi and the company, executive producer James Claeys offered to sell his own house in order to finance the film and while Galluppi was uncertain at first he eventually accepted Claeys' offer. Galluppi shot the film over the course of 20 days on a $1 million budget. Prior to working in film, Galluppi had a music career which involved a lot of travel and often described a recurring feeling of being a "fish out of water" when entering establishments in small sparsely populated areas noting the project came together when he found a diner set at the Four Aces Movie Ranch in Palmdale, California while location scouting.

Release

The Last Stop in Yuma County premiered at Fantastic Fest on September 23, 2023. The film was released in the United States in select theaters and on digital platforms on May 10, 2024, by Well Go USA Entertainment.

Reception

Box office

In North America (Canada, the United States, and Puerto Rico), The Last Stop in Yuma County grossed $41,520 from 45 cinemas during its opening weekend, finishing 29th in the box office rankings. As of May 2024, that constituted 100% of the film's revenue worldwide.

Critical response

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 96% of 69 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 7.9/10. The website's consensus reads: "A smart, tautly constructed crime thriller with some fresh twists, The Last Stop in Yuma County marks writer-director Francis Galluppi as a talent to watch." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 72 out of 100, based on 11 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews. Sam Raimi lauded the film which led to him approaching Galluppi to hire him to direct a new film in the Evil Dead franchise.

External links

• The Last Stop in Yuma County at IMDb