In End Of The Road, Queen Latifah speeds down a fun but familiar path

End Of The Road, premiering September 9 on Netflix, delivers pretty much everything you want from an action thriller, and it benefits from a most unexpected and welcome element: characters you care about. Queen Latifah stars as Brenda, a widow who has lost her house and all her money, and is about to hit the road to start a new life in Houston with her kids Cam (Shaun Dixon) and Kelly (Mychala Faith Lee), and her younger brother Reggie (Chris Bridges, better known as the rapper Ludacris). A delay lands them in a motel, where they overhear a late-night fight and then a gunshot. Brenda, who’s a nurse, and a very reluctant Reggie enter the room, but the victim promptly bleeds out despite her best efforts. Unbeknownst to Brenda, Reggie—an inherently decent semi-stoner who works at Chik-Fil-A—grabs a bag full of cash the dead guy had stashed away.

Of course, that money actually belongs to a mystery man who presents himself as a threatening, disguised voice over the phone—and he wants his money back, by any means necessary. Brenda quickly gets Reggie to divulge what he’s done to land them all in trouble, but the wheels—literally and figuratively—are in motion. The group goes on the run, but they’ve also got to contend with a couple of local, racist hooligans who took offense to Kelly giving them the finger after they catcalled her. Cue car chases, family drama, a kidnapping, a relentless sheriff (Beau Bridges), major reveals, and Brenda’s nerve-wracking, middle-of-nowhere drop-in on a den of rednecks.

Director Millicent Shelton, a veteran of dozens of music videos and television shows (including two episodes of Latifah’s series Star), wisely builds tension while exploring their family dynamic, and then stomps on the gas to bring it all home. Shelton also doesn’t stint on the action-thriller staples, staging car chases that are smartly shot and edited for maximum effect. Characters drop F-bombs instead of annoyingly watered-down synonyms designed to secure a PG-13 rating, and gunshots cause serious damage to human bodies. Kids are put at risk, and it’s appropriately tough to watch. And a couple of very much deserved and gruesome deaths elicit cheers; as in “That motherfucker had it coming.”

Again, we’ve seen this kind of movie countless times, and the basics of the genre are fully accounted for—and well executed. But the performances and a rare willingness to develop the family angle elevate End Of The Road above other examples of its ilk. Latifah’s Brenda is tough, loving, raw, and real, and she kicks complete and total ass when compelled to do so during an extended sequence where the character takes on a bunch of bad guys and gals with her fists and feet, a broken bong, and a rifle.

Latifah even gets to deliver a couple of Clint Eastwood-esque bits of dialogue. Better yet, she shares genuine chemistry with Bridges (who delivers an effective, toned-down performance), Dixon (who slays with some of the movie’s best lines, and convinces in his dramatic moments), and Lee (who humanizes her cranky sister role). A few brief but important flashbacks shine additional informative light on Brenda and her family and their happier recent past.

The script, credited to Christopher J. Moore and David Loughery, also makes time for a few nods to faith and it digs about as deep as it can into race and racism, considering the genre’s limitations. Although Brenda and her family, who are African American, seem to only run into one-dimensional, “bad” white people, the conversations they have amongst themselves ring more complex and true.

Ultimately, Shelton crafts a gritty, entertaining, emotionally engrossing ride of a movie that’s part Taxi, part No Country For Old Men, and just a smidge Are We There Yet? And even if the rough time Brenda and her family experience seems for them to go on forever, one of the best things about End Of The Road is that it clocks in at a brisk 91 minutes.