Grindhound

Logline: After a violent robbery, a woman searching for a purpose joins a group of private investigators, whilst her ex-husband's troubling secret life catches up to her. Synopsis: June Felcham needs a purpose. She sits, slumped in a lawn chair in her backyard watching a burning trash can. She leaves her own, empty home like it’s someone else's and moves in with her OCD sister Jeanie and Jeanie’s husband (Harry) and two young kids. At night, Harry stumbles in drunk and wants to have sex, but June says they shouldn’t continue their infidelity while she’s living with them. At Marty’s Mini Mart, June’s mum’s necklace is ripped from her neck by tweakers in a violent robbery. Back home, Jeanie reprimands June for losing the necklace, as it’s all they have left of their mum. June promises to get it back. She goes to the Sheriff’s office but it’s clear the police are under equipped and incapable of helping. She’s given a business card for the Grindhound Detective Agency. They can help. At the Grindhound office, June meets the boss, Duck, and his detectives: veteran Crooner, blunt instrument Brett, and police academy dropout Marlon. The Grindhounds are busy with a case and June is turfed away as she has no money and no leads. June gathers intel on the tweakers and returns to the Grindhounds. They offer to look into it, but unsatisfied, June heads to the tweaker's drug squat herself. At the squat, June claims back her mum’s necklace, but only after a brutal fight. Her escape is aided by Brett, who arrives in the nick of time. Back home, June gives the necklace to Jeanie to look after. On a snowy mountain pass Rick Felcham escapes gangsters with the help of his old crew, headed by a gnarly Bandit called Marie. Rick owes Marie a lot of money. They will escort Rick back home where he has money stashed. Lucille, Rick’s girlfriend, is brought along as insurance. At the Grindhound office, June asks for a job. Surprisingly, Duck hires her. She’s sent out with Crooner and Brett, to do surveillance on a wealthy man’s teenage daughter who’s joined a biker gang. At a biker bar, June gets evidence that the girl is complicit in her new life but loses two fingers after the girl attacks her with a knife. The evidence is enough for the case to be closed and for the Grindhounds to get paid, but June refuses her cut. At Jeanie’s, June isn’t welcome anymore now that Jeanie has the necklace back and her husband back in her bed. June goes home to find Marlon searching the house for something. Angry, June confronts Duck at a bar, where he admits June’s husband owes him a lot of money, and he wants it back. In the desert, Marie interrogates Rick and tortures Lucille to get him to disclose the location of the money stash. She sends Josie, her enforcer, to escort Rick home to get it. At Jeanie’s, Harry has been kicked out for cheating on Jeanie multiple times. June returns home again, this time to find Rick waiting for her. He asks her about a blue suitcase full of cash he hid in the crawl space, but she claims to have buried it in the desert. They play-act to coax Josie out from hiding and June kills her. Rick turns angry and rushes to Jeanie’s to try and get answers out of her instead. There, June says that she actually burnt the money. June takes him to the Grindhound office where she asks Marlon to help smuggle Rick out of state and out of her life. Rick reveals that he has always had the money to pay his debts, but doesn’t see why he should be out of pocket. He uses other people’s money to pay off his debts. Marlon reveals his boss is Duck, and Rick knows he’s screwed. Marie and her bandits surround the office and attack. June, Rick and Marlon fend them off in a firefight but they’re too strong. Marie demands to be made whole. But the Grindhounds arrive and kill all the bandits. Lucille breaks free of her bonds and kills her torturer, Marie, before leaving the whole ordeal behind her, including Rick. Rick escapes out back and June tells Duck she can make him whole. Back home June finds her dog’s grave empty, another of Rick’s money stashes. She doesn’t care - she pours gin throughout her house and sets fire to it. Meanwhile, the Grindhounds do the same to their office, with the dead bandits piled inside. At Jeanie’s, June watches a film with her sister, nephew, and niece, bridges mended somewhat after a period of emotional turmoil. In the burnt-out husk of the Grindhound office, June meets with Duck, a black suitcase with her. June reveals she found out about Duck’s past of bad investments and his intention to start a racket with the money. Duck gets angry and tries to strangle June to take the money. June kills him in self-defense. June from the beginning of the story sits, slumped in a lawn chair in her backyard watching a burning trash can. Next to it….a blue suitcase full of cash. Did she really burn it? We’ll never know…