Miles Away, which premiered at the 2025 Austin Film Festival, is one of those quiet, surprising films that sneaks up on you. Written, directed, and led by Jackie Quinones, it’s both simple in concept and remarkably layered in execution. The story unfolds almost entirely inside a car, where Jess—a rideshare driver with faded Hollywood dreams—spends her days ferrying eccentric passengers while juggling the pressures of her chaotic family life. Yet within that confined space, Quinones manages to create a world that feels vast, alive, and deeply human.
Jess, portrayed with subtle honesty by Quinones herself, is the kind of protagonist who stays with you. She literally drives the film from the first to the last scene. She’s awkward, self-aware, and often hilariously self-sabotaging, but she also shows warmth and quiet resilience. As her day unfolds through snippets of conversations and phone calls, we begin to see a woman whose ambitions have shrunk to match her circumstances—and who’s only now starting to realize it. There’s a bittersweet humor in watching her play therapist to strangers while her own life teeters on the edge.
The film’s structure is deceptively simple: a series of rides that become small, moving vignettes. But beneath that lies a meditation on identity, loneliness, and the quiet ways dreams fade or evolve. Quinones uses the car as both a literal and emotional vessel, a space where people reveal more of themselves than they intend. The camera never feels static; instead, it turns each encounter into a reflection of Jess’s own state of mind.
Luis Guzmán appears as one of Jess’s many passengers, bringing a welcome burst of humor and warmth to her otherwise restless day behind the wheel. Like the other riders who come and go from her car, he’s less a plot catalyst than a mirror—reflecting pieces of Jess back to herself. Andre Royo and Jessica Pacheco also leave strong impressions in smaller roles; each encounter nudges Jess a little closer to self-awareness and adds to the film’s quiet emotional depth.
What stands out most about Miles Away is its intimacy. Quinones’s triple role as writer, director, and actor gives the film a unified voice and authenticity that feels deeply personal. There’s a richness to the characters, and Jess is instantly relatable—funny, flawed, and searching. It’s a film more about emotion than plot, an experience that’s quietly moving and, in the end, surprisingly uplifting. Miles Away might take place within the confines of a car, but it manages to convey something deeply human.