Road movie

A road film is a film genre in which the film's plot takes place during a journey.

History

The genre has its roots in spoken and written tales of epic journeys, such as the "Odyssey" and the "Aeneid". The road film is a standard plot employed by screenwriters. It is a kind of bildungsroman, a kind of story in which the hero changes, grows or improves over the course of the story. The modern "road picture" is to filmmakers what the heroic quest was to Medieval writers.

The on-the-road plot was used at the birth of American Cinema but blossomed in the years after World War II, reflecting a boom in automobile production and the growth of youth culture. Even so, awareness of the "road picture" as a genre came only in the 1960s with "Easy Rider" and "Bonnie and Clyde."

tructure

Like their antecedents, the road movie tends towards an episodic structure. In each episode, there is a challenge to be met, although not all of them will be met successfully. In most episodes, a piece of the plot is revealed - knowledge or allies are gained, and so on. Sometimes, as "Heart of Darkness", this progress is inverted, and each episode represents a loss rather than a gain.

Road movies traditionally end in one of four ways:
* having met with triumph at their ultimate destination, the protagonist(s) return home, wiser for their experiences.
* at the end of the journey, the protagonist(s) find a new home at their destination.
* the journey continues endlessly.
* having realised that, as a result of their journey, they can never go home, the protagonists either choose death or are killed.

Notable Examples

Notable examples include
* "Death Proof"
* "Running on Empty (1982 film)"
* "Gone In 60 Seconds"
* "Mad Max"
* ""
* "Duel"
* "Easy Rider"
* "Vanishing Point"
* "The Doom Generation"
* "Planes, Trains and Automobiles"
* "Natural Born Killers"
* "Rain Man"
* "Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry"
* "Thelma and Louise"
* "Elizabethtown"
* "Wild at Heart"
* "Little Miss Sunshine"
* "Sideways"
* "Y tu mamá también"
* "Smokey and the Bandit"
* "Diarios de Motocicleta"
* "Rat Race"
* "Radio On"
* "Larger Than Life"
* "The Hitcher"
* "The Cannonball Run"
* "The Man Who Knew Too Little"
* "Pee-wee's Big Adventure"
* "Midnight Run"
* "Stranger Than Paradise"
* "Belly"
* "The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert"
* "Dumb and Dumber"
* "Tommy Boy"
* "Transamerica"
* "The Muppet Movie"
* "The Last Detail"
* "Apocalypse Now"
* "Children of Men"
* "Stand by Me"
* "National Lampoon's Vacation"
* "Fandango"
* "Billy Madison"
* "Road Trip"
* "Kiki's Delivery Service"
* "Two-Lane Blacktop"
* "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"
* "The Terminator"
* ""
* "Raising Arizona"
* "Into the Wild"
* "Darjeeling Limited"
* "La Strada"
* "Dogma"
* "Joy Ride"
* "A Goofy Movie"
* "Euro Trip"
* "About Schmidt"
* "Oh Brother Where Art Thou"
* "The Lord of the Rings film trilogy"
* "The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie"
* "The Straight Story"
* "Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle"
*""
* " [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097521/ Homer and Eddie] "
*"Taste of Cherry"
*"Kings of the Road"
*"Alice in the Cities"
*"The Wrong Move"
*"Paris, Texas"
*"Until the End of the World"
*"Coupe de Ville"

References

* In "Easy Rider", Wyatt complains that his life is like being in a road movie.
* They Might Be Giants wrote a song entitled "Road Movie to Berlin", featured on the album Flood. Also, their song "Everything Right is Wrong Again," from their self-titled debut album, makes a repeated reference to "The Long Long Trailer".
* In the "Family Guy" episodes "Road to Rhode Island", "Road to Rupert", "Road to Europe" and the upcoming episode, "Road to Germany", large portions of the film series are grafted onto the show.

"Road to" movies

"Road to..." also refers to seven comedy films starring Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, and Dorothy Lamour.

Filmography

* [http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/roadmovies.html Road Movie Filmography] (via UC Berkeley)

Bibliography

* [http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/roadmoviesbib.html Road Movies:] A Bibliography of Materials in the UC Berkeley Library
* "The Road Story and the Rebel: Moving Through Film, Fiction, and Television" by Katie Mills
* "Save the Cat" by Blake Snyder