US merchant sailor Alex Walker is stranded in Mexico, penniless and wanted by the police. He meets and joins up with an unlikely couple - ageing but likeable shit Phillip Mills and young sexy, frustated wife Missy. The three develop a curiously inter-dependent relationship. Meanwhile, Police Captain Diaz and Detective Ortega are closing in and the plot circle is closed at Tapachula rail station amidst a stack of mistakes and wrong decisions.
Acting
Lithgow's wounded dignity steals every scene he's in.
Cinematography
Tapachula's railway station as inevitable doom machine.
Direction
McBride lets scenes breathe until they suffocate.
Director
Jim McBride
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
McBride made his name with 1967's underground mock-doc 'David Holzman's Diary'—this is his studio-system oddity, barely released and barely remembered.
The 1993 erotic thriller boom was collapsing; this film's commercial failure helped kill the genre's mid-budget existence. Lithgow would pivot to '3rd Rock' months later.
US
