This Back Roads trailer tries to whip things into a lather a little too quickly, but I’m sensing intensity. Based on Tawni O’Dell’s 2004 novel and obviously not a remake of the same-titled 1981 Martin Ritt film with Sally Field and Tommy Lee Jones.

“Alex Pettyfer, probably best known to audiences as the novice male stripper in Steven Soderbergh‘s Magic Mike, always aspired to more. Following years of being sold as little more than a slab of meat to lust after, it’s been an uphill battle for the actor to convince audiences that he has more to offer. With Back Roads, his first go-round in the director’s chair, Pettyfer takes his future into his own hands.” — from Marshall Shaffer’s Tribeca Film Festival review of Back Roads, posted on 4.24.18.

Boilerplate: “After his mother (Juliette Lewis) goes to jail for shooting and killing his abusive father, Harley Altmyer (Alex Pettyfer) is left to care for his three younger sisters in a rural Pennsylvania town. The uneducated Harley works two dead-end jobs to preserve what’s left of his family, including the rebellious, sexual 16-year-old Amber (Nicola Peltz). He finally begins to feel hope when he connects with an older, married woman (Jennifer Morrison). But when shocking family secrets emerge, Harley’s life begins to spiral downward.”