The director of the new thriller Locked has explained the dramatic ending and the deeper meaning behind the final decisions made.
Locked, the American remake of the 2019 Argentinian thriller 4x4, recently hit theaters, bringing a tense, high-stakes claustrophobic journey to the big screen.
Directed by David Yarovesky, the film stars Bill Skarsgard as a young thief trapped inside a seemingly ordinary SUV, with Anthony Hopkins playing the mysterious man pulling the strings. Blending psychological tension with moral philosophy, Locked has captivated audiences with its wild ending.
David Yarovesky Explains Locked 2025's Ending
In Locked, Bill Skarsgard's character, Eddie, spends most of the film trapped inside a car belonging to Anthony Hopkins' character, William.
In the climax, William finally appears in person and forces Eddie on a dangerous drive. Earlier in the film, Eddie had tampered with a power switch beneath the glove box, and in a desperate move, he manages to break it off with his foot, cutting power to the vehicle. This causes the car to plunge off a cliff, killing William while Eddie survives.
In an exclusive interview with The Direct, director David Yarovesky explained how they filmed that "crash sequence" scene.
It was essentially filmed externally and internally, with the team tossing a real car "down that hill a couple of times" and then also filming Hopkins and Skarsgard's internal reactions from a different set:
"It was really challenging because I came into this movie saying, 'I wanna do as much practical as I possibly can.' But then, you have these actors who you can't throw in a car and just have tumble down a hill, right? So you need to do something. So we separated things. We took a real car, tossed it down that hill a couple of times, and put cameras everywhere. We really wanted to destroy that thing. Then we set up this rig to shoot a 360-degree interior plate, and we shot all the elements of it. We shot Anthony Hopkins reacting, we shot Bill reacting, all these things. We constructed this thing so that we could pan through it the way we did."
In the film's final moments, Eddie hitchhikes back into town and finds a bike, determined to keep his promise to pick up his daughter from school. Covered in blood and bruises, he finally reaches her, breaking down in tears as he holds her tightly, reunited at last.
Yarovesky made sure to highlight the contributions of writer Michael Ross, praising his script and the creative freedom he allowed in shaping the film's ending. He said they tried "a million different things" but what was most important was that Locked's ending was "emotionally true" and "a moral tale:"
"In terms of the ending, I wrote probably 30 different versions of the ending. I tried a bunch of different ways for it to go. Michael Ross wrote an incredible script, by the way, and when I read it from moment one, I was like, 'I wanna do this. This writing is spectacular.' He let me tinker with the ending, try a million different things, test it this way and that way, and see what worked the best. The thing was, I just wanted it to be emotionally true and I wanted it to be a moral tale."
The director explained the film's deeper message, emphasizing how Eddie "thinks he needs some money to fix his van, but what he really needs is a better relationship with his daughter:"
"When you get to the end and really see what the movie is and the journey. I think you come to see that it's a story about a guy who thinks he needs some money to fix his van, but what he really needs is a better relationship with his daughter."
Yarovesky reflected on the film's emotional conclusion, emphasizing that while Eddie gets "a better relationship with his daughter at the end," the journey to that moment is anything but easy.
He acknowledged the challenge of striking the right tone, describing it as "a really tricky tonal line to walk" and recalling the uncertainty of whether it would work until seeing Skarsgard bring the moment to life on set:
"And he gets a better relationship with his daughter at the end of the movie. He has to go through hell to learn that lesson, but that's what it is. And I agree with you, it's happy, but there's a hint of melancholy in it. I mean, he's weeping at the end, you know? It was a really tricky tonal line to walk, to be honest. And on the page, it was scary. We went into it going, 'I hope this works.' But when we saw it, when we saw Bill on the day hugging his daughter like that, it was just emotionally powerful, and it worked. So that's the answer to the ending."
Locked is playing in theaters now.
