"Just for the Ride" was filmed in 1978 on silent 8mm. It was later transferred to analog video and eventually digitized. The original soundtrack was not completed with the film project, but all possible original recordings taken during filming were used to create the soundtrack added during digitization.
I'm not altogether sure where the story came from; maybe it was created as we went: two guys rob a house, the cops come, big shoot-out, one captured the other gets away. Good bandits apparently don't let partners stay in jail since the one who got away comes back for a breakout. More shootouts, ending in the obligatory climactic police car chase!
Of course, all of this takes place "far" in the future (1998, if you can read the calendar closely in the beginning!), so it's all about Star Wars style blasters and force fields that were sure to be the norm 20 years from 1978.
Not to give away the ending :) but it is a challenge to figure out what happens. Technically, there are two cop cars chasing the get away car. One cop car wrecks during the arduous chase, so watch for the special effects! This leaves the bandits map-reading while speeding, and therefore they go right over a cliff with remaining cop car in hot pursuit. Just to keep that last bit of suspense, one car supposedly makes it over the cliff since we never see from them again... and one car does not quite make the jump!
If you just have to see how it all turns out, play the mpg of:
Although it may open as a streaming video just by clicking on it, the surest bet is to "right click" and select "save target as". Just be advised it is a 267MB file, so it may take a while! (If your media player just says "connecting" forever, you will probably need to go to the windows task manager and end the media player process.)