Coast to Coast 1980

Madie Levrington is a wealthy and neurotic woman whose husband, Benjamin Levrington, has her committed to a New York mental institution to keep her from divorcing him and taking his money. She manages a daring escape and, in the process, hops a ride on a livestock truck driven by Charles Callahan. As the truck rumbles away, Callahan learns of her escape on a CB radio and of the substantial reward offered for her return, a prospect that catches him at a moment when he is deeply in debt and being pursued by a repo man.

Behind her back, Callahan becomes entangled with a group that wants Madie back, and he even shares part of the reward money with the woman who leads them. Yet amid the danger, a surprising attraction grows between Madie and Callahan. He teaches her how to handle the truck—quite frantically, after he is knocked aside by a bull and sent flying, a moment that underscores the absurd mix of danger and comic bravado that threads through their alliance.

Madie eventually discovers the money he’s been given and confronts Callahan about how he obtained it. He claims he took it unwillingly, but she does not believe him, and in a bold turn she climbs back into the truck and drives off on her own. Callahan, not ready to give up, ends up hitching a ride on the back of a motorcycle with an older man. When they finally close the distance, he must leap from the bike and grab onto the moving truck, finding himself in the same precarious position Madie started from.

The chase culminates as Madie returns the truck to her husband’s backyard party, where he pleads for her to stop and insists that “everything will be just fine.” In a climactic rush of chaos, she uses the truck to wreak havoc at the celebration, tearing through guests’ expectations and smashing obstacles as she clears a path toward her own resolve. The party erupts into pandemonium as the truck barrels through the yard, and the moment reaches its peak when it barrels right through the house, halting only when the truck can go no further.

Benjamin tries to choke Madie in a final act of desperation, but Callahan bursts from the trailer, tackles him to the canvas, and points to himself as the driver of the escape. With Madie’s finger pointed at the truth, the two of them seize the chance to slip away, even as they collide once more with the repo man, who ultimately concedes the truck to Callahan.

The film closes on a note of wry relief and uneasy partnership, with Madie and Callahan sharing a volatile bond forged in capricious misadventure, and the sense that the road ahead will be anything but predictable.