Like the play, the film was inspired by the true story of Max Bell, a taxi driver who traveled from Broken Hill to Darwin to seek euthanasia after he was diagnosed with a terminal illness.

The film received positive reviews and was nominated for nine AACTA Awards, winning Best Actor for Caton and Best Adapted Screenplay for Sims and Cribb.

Refusing to become committed to a hospital, he learns that a euthanasia device has been invented by Dr. Nicole Farmer at a clinic in the Northern Territory capital city of Darwin.

Due to euthanasia only being legal in the Northern Territory, Rex embarks on a 3,000-kilometre journey, in his Ford BA Falcon taxi, to Darwin to end his life on his own terms.

Unable to wait any longer, Rex has Julie hook him up to the device and answers the questions required to initiate the euthanasia procedure, but as the drugs start to head towards his bloodstream, he disconnects himself.

He had been unable to obtain the signatures required to proceed with euthanasia in Darwin and died slowly in a hospital in Broken Hill, the fate he was trying to avoid.

[4] The euthanasia device invented by the fictional Nicole Farmer in the film is based on Australian physician Philip Nitschke's Deliverance Machine, which was used legally in the Northern Territory while the Rights of the Terminally Ill Act was in effect.