Last Stop in Yuma County, The

Equal parts western and heist thriller, writer/director Francis Galluppi’s debut feature harnesses the energy of the stripped-down action B-movies of the 1970s and distills it into a wry chamber piece rife with acerbic dialogue, tense standoffs, and memorable double-crosses.

A traveling knife salesman sips coffee and works through a day-old crossword puzzle in the hottest diner in Arizona while waiting for the fuel truck to refill the pump at the last gas station for a hundred miles. While waiting, he suddenly finds himself in the middle of a violent hostage situation upon the arrival of two bank robbers who are on the run after a recent heist. As the temperature rises and the pressure builds, our knife salesman makes a fateful decision that will change his life forever. What’s a four-letter word for, "Take the money and run?"