Writer-director Alexander Ullom’s It Ends takes what should be a simple late-night drive and transforms it into a surreal journey into the unknown. After helping a friend move into a new apartment, recent graduates James (Phinehas Yoon), Day (Akira Jackson), Fisher (Noah Toth), and Tyler (Mitchell Cole) decide to grab some food before heading home. But when their GPS leads them deeper into a desolate forest, they soon realize that the road ahead has no end, and stopping may be even worse.
Surrounded by mysterious people who swarm their car whenever they pull over, the four friends are forced to keep driving. Days turn into months, months into years, and somehow their car never runs out of fuel. They don’t grow hungry. They don’t grow tired. They simply keep moving.
On the surface, It Ends gives audiences the elements of a traditional horror film: an isolated forest, mysterious human figures and four friends trapped somewhere they cannot escape. Yet the film’s greatest horror isn’t necessarily what is waiting outside the car. It’s the uncertainty of what lies ahead, the fear of being stuck in a life you don’t know how to navigate.
Each of the four friends enters the journey carrying their own struggles. James is rational and guarded, often struggling to express what he is feeling. Day carries the weight of her own emotional battles, while Fisher approaches their impossible situation with a more hopeful outlook. Tyler, meanwhile, appears increasingly disconnected from the idea of settling into the life that adulthood seems to demand.
Together, they embody a generation standing at an uncomfortable crossroads. They’ve graduated. They’re supposed to know what comes next. They’re supposed to have a plan. Instead, they’re stuck.
And suddenly, the endless road becomes more than just a terrifying place. It becomes a metaphor for adulthood itself. They’re moving, but they’re not necessarily getting anywhere.
You can keep moving without knowing where you’re going. You can make plans without knowing whether they’ll lead anywhere. You can spend years travelling forward and still wonder whether you’ve actually moved at all. For a generation living with uncertainty about the future, It Ends turns that feeling into a literal nightmare.
But surprisingly, the film’s answer to that uncertainty isn’t found in escaping the road. It’s found inside the car.
As the friends spend more and more time together, their vehicle becomes their entire world. They argue, joke, play ridiculous games and find ways to entertain themselves despite their impossible circumstances. Their conversations can feel meaningless at times, but perhaps that’s precisely what makes them feel human. When there is nothing else left to control, sometimes all you can do is laugh with the people beside you.
That friendship becomes one of the film’s most hopeful ideas. The world outside may be frightening and incomprehensible, but the people beside you can make an unbearable journey feel slightly more survivable.
That idea is captured perfectly when one character asks, “What if we’re supposed to suffer here? What if that’s the point?”
It is a haunting question because it extends far beyond the road. Is suffering simply something we endure while waiting for life to begin? Or is there meaning in the people we meet, the moments we share and the ways we continue moving forward despite not knowing where we will end up?
For all its ambition, however, It Ends is not always an easy film to follow. Its deliberately abstract storytelling leaves many questions unanswered, and while that uncertainty may be intentional, there were moments where I found myself searching for clarity rather than becoming immersed in the mystery. The film asks audiences to sit with uncertainty, and sometimes that became more confusing than compelling. Yet, there is something strangely fitting about a film that refuses to give us a clear destination.
Perhaps It Ends isn’t really interested in telling us where the road leads. Perhaps it wants us to consider what we do while we’re on it.
Because sometimes the scariest part isn’t being lost. It’s moving forward without knowing where you’re going, and choosing to keep driving anyway.
An endless road, with no way back? The only question is: how long can you keep driving? It Ends arrives in theatres August 21, 2026.
