User Reviews

This has become a staple on the Lifetime Movie Channel since it first aired in 2006 and for a good reason as it's a pretty good movie. For most of it anyway. Beth Welland (Kathleen Robertson) is a clerk in a law firm and a single mother raising a handicapped son and trying to make ends meets. Diana Burke (Andrea Roth) juggles family life and a career as a married mother of two and a successful advertising executive. Beth misses her exit off the freeway driving to work one day due to a combination of being inattentive in her driving and Diana being to assertive in her driving. So begins a chain of events that snowballs into the ultimate day of stress for Beth and concluding when Diana and Beth's paths cross again at the end of the day. The film cuts back and forth to Beth and Diana as we follow them through their day. Robertson is compelling as the stressed out Beth whose day just keeps getting worse. John Fawcett directs. Excellent camera work from cinematographer Norayr Kasper with a tense music soundtrack by Mike Shields and superb editing by Brett Sullivan. I was with this movie until it's highly implausible climax. (SPOILER ALERT) Diana has a pistol (convienantly loaded) that her son had brought to school earlier in the day. Diana was called to the school and given the gun which she put in her center counsel of her Jeep. Beth recognizes Diana as the driver who cut her off earlier in the day when Beth's car breaks down later in the day. As traffic backs up Beth approaches Diana's car and starts smashing it. At this point Diana could have reached for the gun and simply pointed it at her attacker Beth who is outside her vehicle and Beth would have backed off and that would have been that. Instead Beth continues to pummel Diana's Jeep until Diana can weave out of the backed up traffic and split. Beth's car is now working again so she begins a high speed pursuit. Diana loses control of her Jeep and it rolls over before coming to a stop on it's roof. Everything in the car would have been widely scattered about and Diana is strapped in her seat belt upside down, severely injured and on the verge of losing consciousness but yet manages to find the pistol and fire off a shot at Beth as Beth approaches Diana's wreck to administer aid instead of havoc. I realize they were going for an ending with a twist but this was a little far fetched. The whole movie was a little far fetched for that matter but it was a great ride with tension you could cut with a knife throughout. I would give it a 7.0 out of 10 but with a more plausible climax I would have rated it higher.

This film was on CTV the other day so I decided to watch it figuring there was nothing else decent on TV at the time and my internet was down.

The film had potential it really did. The acting was decent, You really felt sympathy for the mother who had been fired from her job and was trying to look after her handicapped son all while about to fight a bitter custody battle over him with her ex husband. Throughout the film as more things go wrong for her she becomes more aggressive and violent in her behavior until she has a complete meltdown near the end of the film which causes a huge car accident involving the other character a business woman with an unemployed husband and 2 kids struggling to make ends meet.

The were several problems I had with this film. For one, there are a couple of instances that I didn't find all the plausible. For one if Diana was armed with gun why didn't she pull it out when the the beth first confronted her and start destroying her vehicle? The very sight of the gun would have been enough to get her to stop. Why did she wait until after the car accident already happened? Beth's car breaks down and Diana speeds off after the incident, yet she is able to get her car to start again and catch up to her? Not likely. The child doesn't seem all the broken up after hearing that his mother has just died.

The other problem I had was just the shear abruptness of how the film ended. The conclusion was less than satisfying. It was as if the writers literally ran out of ideas and just had the film end with Beth dying and her child living happily ever after with his father and stepmother they drive off into the sunset as if nothing happened. The father even has a smile on his face. I would think he would at least be more saddened by the fact that the mother of his child is dead. Diana loses her leg, but really I felt no such visceral reaction to that. It was a numbing experience. This film could have been so much more if they had more competent writers but hey what do you expect from a TV movie.

THIS CONTAINS SPOILERS-

I was in complete shock at how well done and suspenseful this film is. Both actresses deliver the goods- Andrea Toth (of Rescue Me) and Kathleen Robertson both are perfectly cast as the Career Woman and the Single Mother who meet in a very disturbing way. Within the 2 hours of the film, we live a 24 hour period in both of their lives concurrently.

Andrea is an Ad Exec with huge pressure to perform in her career as well as home- her husband is unemployed and she has 2 teenage children to support, and another on the way. As viewers, we can plainly see that she is completely preoccupied 100% of the time. She is up for a promotion and today is the day she must give a presentation that will make or break her promotion to VP.

Kathleen is a single mom living in a small apartment right off the freeway, raising her child, who is in a wheelchair. Her car is on the fritz, and she has no money to spare. She works as a lawyers assistant and everything in her life seems to go wrong. When we meet her today, she is late to work and isn't there to receive a affidavit her boss needs for court that day. He demands she go get the document- and she ends up having to run for blocks and blocks to catch up with the bicycle messenger. She finally gets the document only to return to work to be fired. At her wits end, she pawns her necklace to buy her child a birthday present. When she goes to meet her ex and her child for birthday dinner, her ex threatens to take her son away. As the viewer, you can literally feel the pressure in your chest, watching this woman's world crumble.

Andrea, meanwhile, is called back to her sons school during her hectic day because he has taken one of his father's antique guns to school. She cant get her husband on the phone, so she takes her son home. She then sees her husband pull up with his golf clubs in the back of the car. Again, as a viewer- you can identify with the frustration. She returns to a job site where an ad is being shot, and her car is towed. She then fails to get to the important client meeting and loses the promotion. When she finds out all the flights out of the airport are delayed, she makes the unwise decision to get to the client at the airport.

Throughout the entire film, the two main characters are weaving in and out of each others lives- all while desperately trying to be Super People Who Get Things Done Without Help. First Andrea cuts Kathleen off on the freeway in the morning, causing the lateness that makes her miss the document delivery. Then the commercial being shot makes Kathleen unable to return to work with the document on time. Andrea's problems with her son at school cause her to be absentminded enough to park in a tow away zone- therefore losing the client. Kathleens car stalls once again at the end, this time with Andrea behind her trying to get to the airport.

Kathleen recognizes Andrea as the woman who caused the delay in the morning, and in a Falling Down moment, confronts Andrea who is still in her car. She then proceeds to bash the SUV with the telescope she had purchased with the money from pawn. Andrea floors it in fear- and Kathleen follows in hot pursuit. They have a nightmarish accident, which is shown throughout the story in pieces, without giving anything away.

At the end, we discover that after the accident, Kathleen attempts to help Andrea out of her SUV in the pouring rain. At that time, Andrea pulls the antique gun and shoots Kathleen in the chest. They are both taken to the hospital and Andrea lives, while Kathleen does not.

Claiming self defense, Andrea will go to trial for the shooting- but she did not lose the baby, although she lost part of one of her legs. She then vows to spend more time on things that matter. It was devastating to see the impact of road rage and frustration from the day to day pressures we all suffer. So many things loom large when we cant step away from them and see them clearly. This story is a perfect example of that, and the actresses are both superb.

On the surface this is a low-budget made-for-TV movie but I found myself sinking into it more and more and more until my entire body was tensing and my hands clenching. When a story comes along which compels you to THINK after it is finished, it is a gem. This was by no means an air-tight written story but the CHARACTERS were real and their lives were real. Based on a '24' real-time type script, the movie follows one day in the lives of two completely unrelated women. Their only connection is a horrific accident involving the two of them resulting from road rage at the end of it. The movie begins at the end, in effect, and gives us the details of that day gradually. The camera occasionally shows us the time during the flashbacks, on an office wall or a car dashboard. It is filmed in a real-life, over-the-shoulder, CNN type mode which makes you feel like you are walking into the conference room with Andrea Roth's Diana Burke or sitting at a table in a restaurant with Kathleen Roberston's Beth Welland. And all the while, the anger and despair of these women slowly builds to that exploding point.

The movie is very much an indictment of our dog-eat-dog society as well. Even though these women live in the bustle of the city they are ALONE and it is a shock to you to realize that the human being next to you on the highway or passing you in the hallway could be living a life like these two women. The movie ends with one of them surviving and the other passing away and you, having entered into their lives, are left to process what decisions and actions and circumstances brought them to that fateful moment. That's all. And you will, if you see the movie.

There are two very powerful scenes in this movie which I want to mention. Kathleen Robertson's performance here I will not soon forget. There is a scene in the restaurant just before the cake arrives during her son's birthday party - and while the son has been invited to the kitchen by the chef - where Beth has been informed by her ex that his lawyer feels they have a strong case for full custody of their son. She has just lost her job and has nothing while he and his new girlfriend have just bought a nice house in the burbs. He mentions it casually like it was of little consequence but when the son returns the camera is only on Kathleen's face. For a full minute all of the noise in the place filters out and you are left with seeing the poison come into her eyes in complete silence. I have not seen or felt a more authentic, human scene in a film. The other was at the end - and this is the real spoiler - as the doctors inform those at the hospital of Beth's death. Once again the camera is only on one person - her son - and when the moment comes his entire body wilts and his eyes become vacant. You realize that he is the only one who will miss her. I was left gasping as I saw it.

For anyone who is looking for a real human story here is one for you.