Synopsis
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It is the Christmas season in Los Angeles, 1999: the eve of the Millennium. After a botched job delivering a shark because the inattentive owner of Palmer's Pick-up and Delivery Service, BRUCE PALMER (Robert Carradine), is distracted watching a video tape of a variety show hosted by DICK CASH (Morton Downey, Jr.), Palmer and his partner PEARL (Richard Hillman) go back to headquarters. ThatÕs a back room at the house of Palmer's mother, ELEANOR (Alice Ghostley), where they sit around and wait for the phone to ring. Business sucks. When it finally does ring the man on the other end, a wheel-chair bound, ex-reverend named ERNIE (Soupy Sales), makes them an extraordinary proposition: deliver a single crate of merchandise to his brother, TOM (Garrett Morris), in Florida before midnight on New Year's Eve and they will receive $12,000.00 - a whopping sum for the two movers! The money will be paid out in cash installments at various Western Union offices along the way, provided only that they arrive at each office by a certain deadline. Although Pearl is leery about the mysterious crate and although his girlfriend MIRIAM (Tilghmin Bollens) commits suicide that night, Palmer convinces Pearl to help him with this job. The next day, Christmas eve, Palmer and Pearl pick up the crate from Ernie's antique shop in Burbank. While Palmer only sees dollar signs, Pearl has an eerie sense about the crate and its contents. Ernie wonÕt tell them what's in it, 'You have my word it's nothing illegal. But you must swear the crate will remain closed.Ó What Pearl senses and what Ernie won't say is that the fate of the world is in that crate -- and it rests in our hapless heroes' hands. While Mrs. Palmer bemoans being alone over Christmas, Palmer and Pearl hit the road. Ernie calls Tom to say the crate is on its way.
Meanwhile, an ex-con, BO(Patrick Kilpatrick) picks up his former cellmate and lover, MAC(Neil Giuntoli), at the prison gates. When Mac repells his advances, Bo offers a job. A mysterious, sickly boss, MR. PRICE(Talia Shire), is looking for a missing crate. If Price doesnt recover the contents of that crate before midnight New Year's Eve, he will disappear in to oblivion. Now it's a dangerous, madcap race against time. Bo and Mac arrive at Ernie's shop; and, when Ernie refuses to reveal the crate's whereabouts, Bo tortures him to death. Intrigued after overhearing Ernie refer to Dick Cash as 'anti-Christ,' Mac spots PalmerÕs business card on Ernie's desk. Their next stop is PalmerÕs house. While Mac plays with a talking clown head, Bo roughs up Eleanor, forcing her to tell them that Palmer is now in Arizona, at the Wigwam Village Motel. The hoods are hot on the
trail!
Back on the road, Palmer and Pearl encounter Roadside Americana. They give a ride to NORMALENE (Adrienne Stout-Coppola) who is carrying the ashes of her dead relatives in a suitcase. One of her glass containers explodes in choking cloud of gray dust before they drop her at the bus station in Yuma, where a ragged SANTA (John Culager) solicits donations outside the Western Union office that yields the first payment from Ernie and Tom. At the 'Thing,' a terrified Pearl sees a vision of Miriam. At the Wigwam SARAH (Charles Fleischer) the blow torch wielding manager is rather unhospitable. Watching TV reports, Palmer becomes obsessed with the disappearance of Dick Cash, America's #1 talk show host and is convinced thereÕs been foul play. From alligator farms to microwave igloos to diving pigs, they see strange sights the second night out, at the Atomic motel.
Palmer dreams that he is on the show getting paternal advice from Cash and displaying an image of his idol tattooed on his posterior. While Bo keeps calling Mrs. Palmer for updates on the boys' progress. Pearl has another visit from Miriam's ghost and then a glimpse of the recently departed Ernie, giving him the thumbs up sign on the side of the road while he listens to a broadcast EVANGELIST (Piper Laurie) and her visions of the Apocalypse. Pearl is tormented by a buzzing noise from the crate and is more convinced than ever the unusual that something evil is inside of it. While Palmer picks up payment number two, Pearl looks at dioramas in Tintertown. He is spooked and wants to go home. Palmer begs him to stay, 'Only a few more days. I need you Pearl. I canÕt do this alone.' Pearl reluctantly agrees. Bo and Mac arrive at the Atomic Motel to find a gang of clowns trying to make a deal with Price. Bo uses some martial arts moves to disperse them, and while the clowns turn their ire on Mac, Price tells Bo that his prize, if he succeeds, will be his dead motherÕs finger, which has considerable sentimental value for Bo. A few miles down the road, Palmer and Pearl have problems of their own: a flat tire; and, when they get to the next telegraph office after the deadline, the TELEGRAPH OPERATOR(Clu Gulager) turns a furious Palmer away without money. A distraught Bo agonizes over his failure to appease Price, Mac's attempt to cheer him up backfires when a turned-on Bo rapes him. Palmer is turned away without his cash, Bo stops at a convenience store and an angry Mac, turns on Bo's beloved pet Chihuahua(Judy), whose neck he snaps. Bo returns and strangles Mac to death in a fit of rage over Judy's death. From a radio report, Palmer has a revelation: the cufflink engraved 'DC' which he found outside Ernie's shop belonged to Dick Cash. Dick Cash must be hidden in the mysterious crate. When he furiously attacks the crate with his Swiss army knife, Pearl has to draw the line. Open that crate, go against Ernie's wishes, and Pearl leaves. The two buddies are at their witÕs end and at each othersÕ throats. Will they get the crate to Tom in Florida on time and save the world? Palmer wants relief and stops for a drink at a redneck bar, calls Tom and threatens not to deliver the crate unless he gets the missing $2,000. A tough trucker lady named DAWN, (Rosanna Arquette) comes on to him. Palmer reciprocates, she takes him and Pearl to a nearby motel, pulls a gun, forces them to have sex, and steals the truck. Palmer and Pearl start walking in search of the place on the truckerÕs hat, Gulagerville. Bo catches up to them. He hogties them--and the elderly occupants of a nearby trailer home- -planning to torture them with fire for information. Pearl breaks free and in the melee, they barely escape with their lives. Bo is left burning alive next to a dried up Christmas tree. Taking Bo's car, they find Gulagerville, a roadside carny tent, and the truck; but Dawn and the keys are missing. While Palmer has a bizarre encounter with the 3-legged MR. REMO(Grace Jones and Tom Gulager) and a diving pig named RALPH(Ralph). Pearl has a poignant conversation with Miriam in an abandoned church across the highway. Palmer's 'wins' back the keys in a diving contest with Ralph, and the race against the clock is back on. A horribly burned Bo, looking like a cross between a crispy critter and a samurai, guns down a biker, straps his two dead companions onto the motorcycle and continues his pursuit.
That night, in a gas station bathroom, Palmer has a vision of Dick Cash egging him on to open the crate. Outside Pearl has disappeared. He tells Pearl that God has chosen him to save the world. Pearl is inspired! As Ernie's winged wheel chair flies back to heaven, Palmer spots Pearl and tries to talk him down. Impatiently Palmer runs back to the truck and once again tries to open the crate but Pearl tackles him. Palmer hits his head and is knocked out cold. Arriving at the designated delivery spot, the St. Augustine, Florida pier, Pearl meets up with Ernie's brother, Tom. Tom is frantic to get the crate hooked up to a hovering helicopter that will dump it over the Bermuda Triangle. Suddenly the mysterious Mr. Price, in his gleaming black Airstream with a retinue of anomymous other cars, races onto the pier. A ghoulish, charred Bo is not far behind on his motorcycle. Everybody wants that crate! Chaos reigns. Tom yells for Pearl's help but is struck down by one of the cars. Bo gets his motherÕs finger back from Price and joins the attack. Pearl climbs onto a fork lift and leads Bo away from the truck onto the pier, where they duel on their mechanical steeds. Mr. Price screams for the release of the Armageddon bomb so that Satan may rule the world! In the midst of this, Palmer regains partial consciousness and crawls to the crate, commando-style. Bo leaps onto the forklift and to his dismay, the motorcycle with the bodies of Mac and Judy goes off the pier into the sea. Palmer opens the crate. All hell breaks loose. The helicopter blows up. Mr. Price roars with delight as the world perches on the brink of destruction. Bo jumps off the pier after his loved ones. Pearl yells for Palmer to do something quick. Cash appears and suggests that Palmer dump in all the kitschy Roadside Americana knick knacks bought along the trip.
Curiously, the earth stops shaking, the wind dies down, there's a grand pause. Whatever evil lies in the crate cannot comprehend this gesture. A moment passes, then, a flash. The crate explodes. With it, the entire earth, as we know it. When the roar quiets, the smoke filters down into a light haze revealing an Afterworld. This is neither Heaven, nor Hell, but a slow move down a narrow roadway. Palmer and Pearl are heard speaking. Cash reappears to congratulate them on their actions. After he fades away, billboards on the roadside and a ghostly carnival in the distance draw the heroes in. Pearl tells Palmer heÕs happy. Palmer responds, 'Yeah, I know what you mean'; and the two buddies head off in search of some cotton candy.