Drive Back
Directed by Cody Ashford
Written by Jon Sarro
Starring: Zack Gold and Whit Kunschik
Unrated
Runtime: 94 minutes
In select theaters and on digital November 8

by Vannah Taylor, Staff Writer

Cody Ashford’s directorial debut took audiences at 2024’s Screamfest LA on a windy road to madness. Drive Back follows Reid (Zack Gold) and Olivia (Whit Kunschik), an expecting couple who are on their way home from their engagement party. The drive back from Reid’s parents’ cabin is unfamiliar, cluing you into the nature of his relationship with his folks, yet he refuses to take Olivia’s advice on reading the map. The tension between Reid and Olivia nearly causes an accident, leaving them at a fork in the road. When they finally ask for directions from an overly eccentric elderly couple at the “I Forgot” Store, you’re left wondering if we’re being led down a road towards a hicksploitation style road-trip-gone-wrong film, but Drive Back has more twists and turns than expected.

A journey initially planned to take three and a half hours starts to feel like forever and Reid and Olivia start to feel the pressure of being completely alone with one another–pressure that opens up the many cracks that were glazed over in service of the pleasantries of celebrating the next step in their lives. Now that the party is over, all of the resentments they have been harboring make themselves known. The only distraction from their jabs at one another is their realization that not only have they been driving for hours only to pass the same landmarks on this backroad, but that they are not alone in these woods. Just as they have found themselves unable to confidently make it to the next destination in their relationship, they are now lost. Reid and Olivia are both unable to make their way forward or find their way back.

Drive Back is certainly based on an interesting premise. Reminiscent of films like Triangle and Brightwood, the characters of this story are seemingly stuck in an almost Sisyphean predicament, unless they work through what is ailing the relationship. Reid, in particular, seems unready to step into a fatherly role due to his strained relationship with his father. The film opens on a young boy watching as his father shoots a buck right before his eyes–the father’s idea of a lesson in masculinity and survival for his son. Fast forward to their interactions at the engagement party, Reid has never been able to reconcile with his father, at least in a productive way. They argue over the survival kit Reid’s father has planted in the back seat of the car, a gift to aid them on their journey, but nothing more meaningful comes from this interaction–other than a few convenient props to help imbue the rest of the film with signature horror elements. With the potential for revelations about his relationship with his father and with fatherhood in general, Reid’s ending is touching yet unsatisfactory.

Despite some unrealized potential, Drive Back is fun for anyone who enjoys failed road trips, hooded slashers, and whatever else is lurking in the woods. It is a fun and wild ride, and you never know what is around the next bend in a film like Drive Back.