Riff Raff

Elderly Vincent Gauthier [Ed Harris] and his college-age son DJ [Miles J. Harvey] are spending the Christmas and New Year holidays at a quiet vacation cabin in Yarmouth, Maine, hoping for a peaceful retreat. Vincent’s much younger wife Sandy [Gabrielle Union] arrives with groceries, bringing a sense of unsettled energy to the blended family as they try to carve out normalcy amid the season’s tensions.

In the middle of the night, at 4:12 am, a knock on the door interrupts the quiet: Rocco [Lewis Pullman], Vincent’s eldest son, and Marina Bravo [Emanuela Postacchini], Marina’s unborn child growing inside her, appear along with an unconscious Ruth [Jennifer Coolidge], Vincent’s first wife. The room fills with a charged mix of surprise, guilt, and fear as the intruders reveal they have fled a nearby crime scene.

The following day grows increasingly awkward. DJ attempts to wake Ruth, only to be met with a knife threat, until Ruth recognizes him. Sandy, overwhelmed by the intruders’ disruptive presence, drives into town for errands, leaving the house to a tense, uneasy dynamic where long-buried truths begin to surface. Ruth attempts to reconnect with the man she once knew, addressing him as Vin, while the rest of the family grapples with the fragility of their relationships.

Meanwhile, at a roadside market, criminal partners Leftie and Lonnie arrive seeking directions to Yarmouth. A misunderstanding leads Lonnie into a perilous moment when he accidentally triggers a deadly encounter at the market, setting off a chain of violent memories and loyalties that will echo back to the cabin.

Ruth recounts how Leftie, whom she had previously dated, had threatened her at her apartment, heightening the sense that danger hides in every corner of this family’s past. Rocco tells how Marina’s ex Johnny threatened them the day before, while they were out for dinner. Johnny forces Rocco to leave Marina alone with him in the restaurant bathroom, heightening Rocco’s sense of danger—and his thin patience.

The danger turns deadly when Marina’s screams pull Rocco back to the table to find Johnny attempting to rape her, and Rocco is forced to kill him. They flee the scene, drug Ruth, and bring her back to the cabin to hide the crime. Vincent’s demeanor toward Sandy and DJ grows distant as he struggles to navigate loyalties to his former family and the fragile new life he’s trying to build.

Late at night, Leftie and Lonnie catch up to the Gauthier cabin, storming inside with guns drawn and everyone hostage in the living room. Leftie laments Johnny’s death and recalls the heartbreak of a failed family dream—the dream of a boy to carry on the bloodline. He speaks of retribution, ordering Lonnie to kill Ruth and Rocco outside while he tells Sandy and DJ that Vincent killed DJ’s father years earlier, trying to push DJ toward vengeance.

The mood spirals into a deadly confrontation. In the heat of the moment, Vincent shoots Leftie, followed by a volley that felled Lonnie. Sandy, aiming to settle a score of her own, turns a gun on her husband, but Ruth, who has survived the night, shoots Vincent first, insisting that he should have loved her all along.

Weeks pass and Leftie and Lonnie are gone. Vincent awakens from a coma, and the family begins to mend, gathering around the table to find some sense of normalcy again. Rocco and Marina welcome a newborn boy into the world, a small beacon of hope after so much chaos. The story closes with DJ’s hopeful reminder of family’s importance as Vincent, cradling his grandson, stares into the camera and smiles, a quiet acknowledgement that love and resilience can outlast even the harshest storms.

Last Updated: October 09, 2025 at 16:11