There are some stories that are quite straightforward but are made a little complicated to add to the thrill of discovery. Bring Him to Me has a very simple plot, but it is presented through two timelines that converge in the end. This movie is no Memento, and neither is it trying to be. It feels like the intention was to make the story interesting and bring the audience into a mode of anticipation so that the ending could hit that much harder. The characters in the movie are fleshed out as much as they could be, given the nature of the story. There are some good performances turned in by the actors, but Rachel Griffiths is wasted playing the villain. She does still manage to bring some nuance to this performance as well, when she could have very well sleep-walked through it.
Plot Synopsis: What Happens In The Film?
A rookie and a pro—we have seen this so many times. Be it in cop movies or crime thrillers, this type of pairing always entertains and engages because of the inherent conflict posed by the characters. Bring Him to Me introduces us to the Driver, the pro, who has to get Jake, the rookie, to a location to collect the money for a previous job. The rookie has a family, and the pro has some responsibilities he cannot abandon. The stage is set for a road trip that doesn’t look like it will end well. In the meantime, a father-son duo is tracking down Jake and the Driver because the money they are going to collect was stolen from the father.
How Did Frank Find Out Jake’s Location?
This wasn’t the first time Jake had met the Driver. They had met for the job earlier, which hadn’t gone according to plan. They had been accompanied by a man named Leon, who was a maniac and had nearly butchered the plan for all of them. Leon worked for a woman named Veronica, and they had been tipped off that a lot of cash was lying with a man named Frank McCarthy, who laundered money for a lot of high-profile and dangerous men. The job was simply to get the money, but Leon was too volatile, and he almost beat Frank to death. Frank’s son Shaun was present there as well, and he shot Leon, the Driver had to execute a much more panicky getaway than he would have otherwise.
After that near-fatal job, the Driver had the task of taking Jake to Wyevale, where Veronica was waiting to give them their cut from the job. On the way, the Driver made a pit stop, and they were involved in an altercation with some rowdy fellas. They happened to call Shaun for help, and Frank must have understood from the description that it was probably the robbers from before. The Driver drove a very distinct 1970s model of car which Shaun had gotten a good look at during the robbery. A cop had pulled the Driver over, but as he knew Jake, they got out of trouble. But soon Frank and Shaun caught up to them.
How Did Frank And Shaun Die?
The mole in Frank’s team was his son Shaun himself. He had tipped off Veronica, and the plan was to take the money and vanish. But Leon had taken things too far. There was another problem, though. 25 grand was missing from the total amount Shaun had promised would be found in Frank’s locker. So she wanted the Driver to get Jake in so she could figure out if he’d stolen the money. The Driver knew how ruthless Veronica was, and there was almost a guarantee she planned to kill whoever she thought had stolen the money.
Frank wanted his revenge, but he had been beaten up by Leon, who was not present in the car. He didn’t let Jake and the Driver go as they had stolen from him. To save himself, the Driver diverted Frank’s attention to Shaun, revealing that he was the traitor that had to be punished. Frank was left too stunned, and the Driver used the opportunity to overpower him, and Jake attacked Shaun, striking him on the head. Shaun succumbed to the blow, and Frank just couldn’t take that. He gave up fighting the Driver, and it seemed he pulled the trigger himself to commit suicide when the Driver was trying to get the gun away from his hand.
Why Did The Driver Steal The Money?
The Driver begged Veronica to let Jake go, and as Shaun was dead, it didn’t matter if the amount was missing from the total cash. That’s what Shaun’s cut would have been regardless. But Veronica wanted him to bring in Jake anyway. She did assure him that nothing was going to happen to him. The Driver knew that his every move was being monitored. Earlier, he had helped Jake drop his daughter off at home, and he had received a message regarding the detours, implying he better not take them. Perhaps that’s why he didn’t change his course.
The Driver arrived at an old auto shop in Wyevale where Veronica and her gang, including Leon, were waiting. Veronica killed Leon and Jake, as they had not been able to complete the job properly. She left the Driver alive even though she knew he was the one who had stolen the money. He had a debt to repay, and that was how he was going to do it; otherwise, they were going to hurt his son, who lived with the Driver’s sister. Killing Jake was Veronica’s way of torturing the Driver, because she knew he had a conscience. She had plans to kill him, but she wanted him to suffer as much as possible. A man was sent to kill the Driver, but he survived.
During Bring Him to Me‘s ending, Veronica had her final chat with the Driver over the phone, where we learned that she had never been able to properly read his behavior. He was an enigma, which is why he had survived for so long in the business. Veronica guaranteed that he wasn’t going to survive for long, but the Driver had other plans. He called the cop from before, the one who knew Jake. He had left his number, and the Driver used it to give away Veronica’s location in Wyevale, telling him of Jake’s death. Veronica had helped the Driver a lot by finding the woman who had run over his wife. He wore a wedding ring but his wife had long died. The Driver felt indebted to Veronica, but not anymore. Veronica was evil, as she had killed a man just to torture the Driver. He had both his and Jake’s cut, and he found it fitting to leave it all at Jake’s front door for his wife to collect. Veronica would end up in jail, and it’s possible that she might never find the Driver again. He had told her that all the men whose money Frank was handling would not be pleased that Veronica had stolen from them. So she wasn’t going to survive even if she didn’t go to prison. Some hitman was going to murder her eventually. The Driver had gotten rid of the ghosts from his past and had a new life to look forward to—to be a good father and repent for his sins.
