Diane Ford (Michelle Monaghan) is a hard-nosed truck driver who leads a carefree life of all-night bar benders and one-night stands until her estranged 11-year-old son shows up at her door one evening. Not having seen his mother since he was a baby, the blunt but ruminative Peter (Jimmy Bennett) wants as little do with her as she does with him, and their contentious relationship seems to have little hope for resolution. But with Diane's ex-husband Len (Benjamin Bratt) hospitalized, and his new partner (Joey Lauren Adams) unwilling to take on the babysitting burden herself, the two are stuck with each other-at least for a while. Motherhood comes hard for callous Diane, who resists the new responsibility that jeopardizes her hard-earned freedom. However, with the support of a handsome and doting neighbor (Nathan Fillion), she eventually steps reluctantly into her past and looks sidelong at her future, which is not as simple or straightforward as she had once believed. James Mottern makes a solid debut as a writer/director with this superbly crafted, gritty, and intimate family drama. Monaghan's (Gone Baby Gone, The Heartbreak Kid) tour-de-force performance as Diane is not to be missed. Disquieting and authentic, Trucker's ultimate beauty is in its redemption, and it is destined to have audiences in it for the long haul.

I tried to make Trucker for a few years. I almost did a couple of times but the production companies that wanted to make it kept going out of business! It was funny, in a way—and heartbreaking. But I never gave up. It kind of became my religion to make it. And one problem I was always faced with was finding a lead actress that really spoke to me on a gut level. I looked for a long time. Then I saw Michelle Monaghan in a movie called North Country. Her performance in that film is outstanding. But there's this one scene where the character she plays is standing outside her trailer saying goodbye to Charlize Theron's character and the camera holds on Michelle for a beat, not saying a word. I saw that and it hit me like a freight train: ‘There she is. Diane.’ I was pretty excited. I got her the script and she liked it a lot and said she would do it. I didn't have any money anymore. She still said she'd do it. Then I met movie in six months. I didn't believe her. She got the money. She kept her word, which is rare for a producer. One thing is for sure—Celine will get the money. Six months later we went out in the desert and shot it.

I love the movies of the 1970s like Five Easy Pieces and Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore. A lot of people say that these days, but I don't care because it's true. I wanted to make Trucker ring like that, maybe some feeling that it was telling the truth or something, but not banging you over the head with a political or social statement or creating some kind of downer indie that takes itself overly seriously and gives you no room to stretch out and feel it. I wanted something funny in parts, hard in parts, something real, I guess, but overall to get into the main character's head and not force it too much. I wanted to go on this journey with her and try to feel it, really feel what she was maybe going through viscerally, but understated, and to let the character and the viewer have a relationship beyond me. I didn't want to dress it up with a big score or massive movie epiphanies or have the actress pursue some shit-kicking lady-trucker attitude that left no room for anyone.

As far as the look, Lawrence Sher, my director of photography, really saw what I was going for. He inspired me a great deal. We went for a big frame to capture the horizons and show the story's breadth. And it was important to me that it look beautiful, not gritty for grit's sake; I wanted to show the unusual beauty of this particular world. And I wanted it to feel free and open, sweeping at times—like a Western maybe, an American movie in the tradition. There's some French and Italian influence in there, too, I think. Someone called it a “slow burn;” actually, it was Michelle Monaghan. It's maybe this lovely reveal and unwinding of the relationship between the characters, but within a traditional structure. Really, though, I just wanted to feel it. I hope someone else feels it, too.

The entire cast for the film ended up being beyond my hopes: Nathan Fillion, Benjamin Bratt, Jimmy Bennett, and Joey Lauren Adams really helped me make the film I envisioned and I am forever grateful, especially since they did it mostly out of generosity. And Michelle—t his is her movie in ways beyond the obvious. We spent quite a bit of time going through the script to shape it and live in it. And in her performance she always surprised me; she plays to what's between the words, to what's not in the ink. Deirdre Slevin, my editor, really helped me to bring the performances out even more. It was so much fun making this film and I miss it a lot. It was a good religion.