Aahana Swrup
‘Collision Course’ is a Spanish crime thriller that follows a bank robbery. The film explores several what-if scenarios in which one unplanned car crash becomes the impetus for drastically different possibilities. Carla, Tomas, Raul, and Pedro, with the help of a mysterious mastermind, have planned an untraceable heist. They’re the robbers targeting a sparsely guarded bank with their eyes on the prize: Box 34. More importantly, these four are also law enforcement officers and are sure to be part of the ensuing investigation. As such, they have the means to carry out the crime before covering their tracks. However, a pivotal moment of betrayal, distrust, and paranoia throws their perfect crime out of balance. In the tense aftermath that follows, each decision counts as the criminals must do their best to hide in plain sight while also trying to figure out exactly where things went wrong. SPOILERS AHEAD.
Collision Course Plot Synopsis
In 2013, as a financial crisis overtakes the country, bankers like Ernesto become easily despised by the public. Nonetheless, the man goes through his day as usual, grabbing breakfast at a diner before arriving at the Codal Bank to prepare the place for the day. Before the front doors officially open, an old man shows up, hoping to cash in a lottery ticket worth millions. The novelty of the item, especially in these fiscally downtrodden times, convinces the banker to welcome the older man in. However, in doing so, he also inadvertently opens the door to his accomplices: two masked robbers. The trio ties Ernesto up and breaks his fingers to compel him to give out the passcode to the deposit box vault, where they immediately make a beeline for Box 34. When the box unexpectedly turns out to be empty, the robbers leave with whatever other assets they can steal before escaping via a getaway car.
Once on the road, Tomas zeroes in on the missing diamonds and starts accusing the safecracker, Pedro, of stealing them. As an altercation breaks out, it diverts the driver, Raul’s, attention, which leads to the car getting sideswiped by a truck. This is where the story breaks off into branches, depicting scenarios of what would have happened if different team members died in this crash. The first subject is Pedro, Raul’s father, who is burned alongside the car before the survivors commandeer another vehicle to flee from the scene. Tomas works in the forensics department; Raul is an academy student who works in cybersecurity, and Carla is part of the detective duo who are assigned to the case. Between the three of them, they’re able to minimize the fallout, covering up any glaring tracks they left behind. Moreover, Ernesto is also revealed to be working with them behind the scenes.
As the investigation unravels, the burnt car is discovered along with Pedro’s remains. Furthermore, cops also discover the stolen diamonds on his person, confirming that the safecracker had pocketed them. Raul begins to second-guess the entire plan, preferring to instead run away with the haul they had stashed away. When Tomas tries to stop him, the confrontation devolves into a shootout, leading to the death of the forensics. Meanwhile, Raul takes off in the wind. The story shifts, returning to the crash, this time with Raul as the victim in the car crash. Pedro refuses to burn his son along with the car, compelling the robbers to abandon the site without burning the evidence. As a result, when the police open their investigation, the academy student is instantly identified.
Naturally, Pedro is implicated in the crime soon enough. Additionally, Carla’s affair with Raul is discovered, which leads to her and Tomas’ arrest as well. Overall, the getaway driver’s death seems to be the easiest and most efficient way to unravel the entire crime. Next, Carla’s death takes center stage. Once her body is discovered at the crime scene, the police instantly bring Tomas in for questioning. Although his lips remain sealed, he learns that his wife was pregnant when she died. Instantly, he realizes that the detective must have been seeing another man, which leads him to confront Raul once he’s out of the precinct. In the hostile altercation that follows, Tomas kills Raul. Later, when Pedro tries to seek revenge, he falls victim to the aggrieved criminal. While the death of the others seems to only lead to the team’s internal ruin, the final chapter, Tomas’ death, leads them toward the center of a conspiracy hiding at the heart of the diamond heist.
Collision Course Ending: What Actually Happens After the Robbery?
Instead of following a linear narrative, ‘Collision Course’ splits the storyline into chapters, each set in an alternative universe. Each member’s individual death remains the distinguishing factor across these chapters. As such, the story becomes an exploration of the interpersonal dynamic between Carla, Tomas, Raul, and Pedro, who are aligned in their goals but not much else. As a result, in almost every version of the car crash’s aftermath, the team ends up cannibalizing itself before they can even realize something fishy is going on around them. Raul and Pedro’s father-son relationship makes it impossible for either to maintain a level head in the event of the other’s demise. Similarly, Carla’s death sends Tomas off the deep end in glaringly self-destructive ways.
However, the team has a different reaction in the timeline where Tomas is the one who dies in the car crash. Instead of turning on one another, they manage to stay calm and collected, sticking to the original plan. Thus, no dead bodies are found, the investigation is subtly foiled, and the robbers get away with the crime. That is, until two months later, they realize the diamonds in the safe, stolen by Pedro, were fake from the very beginning. The remaining trio undertakes a personal investigation to get to the truth of the matter, only to end up in handcuffs on the other side of the tunnel. However, this is when the story jumps back to the car crash one last time. This time, all four criminals walk away from the incident unharmed.
The story intentionally concludes on an open-ended note, leaving the fates of the characters uncertain. The audience has witnessed every argument, betrayal, and fallout between these four characters. We know their secrets and motivations alongside the overarching diamond conspiracy that they’ve inadvertently fallen victim to. Nonetheless, Carla, Tomas, Raul, and Pedro themselves are perfectly unaware of all these revelations. Thus, in the aftermath of the robbery, they’re as likely to turn on each other as they are to work together and realize that there’s significantly more money to be made in this endeavor. Nonetheless, the film is uninterested in exploring what the actual aftermath might look like for these characters. For the same reason, the audience only gets to accompany them in what-if timelines that never actually come to pass.
Who Has the Real Diamonds?
While the first three chapters of the story center around infighting within the central group, the fourth timeline finally delves into the matter of the diamonds. Carla, Tomas, Raul, and Pedro were recruited for the job by Ernesto, who is another piece of the puzzle. He’s the one who supplies inside information about the bank, including the deposit box number for the diamonds. The fact that he’s the primary victim in the robbery helps him avoid suspicion from the authorities. During the heist, Pedro, who is charged with breaking into the safes, decides to slip the diamonds for himself and later claims that the box had been empty from the beginning. Tomas’ suspicion over this claim is exactly what leads to the titular car crash. In the timeline where the forensics analyst dies, the team manages to keep their cover until the investigation blows over. As a result, two months later, they’re finally safe to unearth their stolen haul and put it back into circulation.
Pedro figures this means he can also take the diamonds out and try to sell them for cash. However, when he gets them checked by an expert, he discovers that all the diamonds are fake. This compels him to reach out to Carla and Raul again. Even though the duo, now a couple, are mad about the older man’s betrayal, they have bigger fish to fry. If the diamonds are fake, that means that the entire robbery was a sham. Some further digging reveals that the owner of deposit box 34 had his assets insured. This means that after the heist, the owner suffers no loss and instead makes a profit through insurance. Thus, the pieces begin to fall into place. Ernesto had actually been working with the owner of the deposit box all this time. He planted the fake diamonds in the safe, then orchestrated the robbery to ensure that the owner got his big payout. The additional haul from the heist is just a bonus for the man who gets to actually pocket the real diamonds himself.
Who Is the Sixth Member of the Heist?
Although four people carry out the robbery, it is actually a six-member affair. Ernesto is the hidden accomplice, whose expertise in the banking system creates the opportunity for the crime and its smooth execution. Later, when the haul is being divided into sections, one share is left for an anonymous sixth member. It’s likely that this share of the spoils was given to the owner of the deposit box. The reason his identity was kept a secret from the others was that Ernesto didn’t want them to be in on the overarching heist, which involves the real diamonds and their insurance payout. Additionally, there was another hidden member: Lola, the banker’s lover. In the actual bank robbery, her role is on the sidelines. She is the waitress who works at the diner where Ernesto has his breakfast on the morning of the crime.
The robbers follow him to the bank from this establishment, making it a point of interest for the police. For the most part, Lola’s role was to throw the police off their groove while remaining as a backup for the banker. Her real job begins two months later, once Ernesto is ready to disappear into his new life with his newly acquired fortune. She’s supposed to bring the diamonds from the deposit box owner to her lover so that the two can leave the country. In reality, this hand-off is a test that the banker sets up for Lola. He knows that she still blames him for the death of his brother. For the same reason, he wants to see if, at the last moment, she’ll stay loyal to him or run away with the diamonds. In the end, Lola chooses the latter. Unfortunately for her, the diamonds she had ingested had always been counterfeit.
Read More: Where Was Netflix’s Collision Course Filmed?
