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25 Essential Road Trip Movies of the Last 25 Years

We’re looking down the horizon and beyond for some of the best road trip movies that defined the genre over the last 25 years! To rev up this list, we selected American movies movies, journeys that begin in the States (where they actually finish is part of the fun). The movies celebrate the sights and sounds of the country, or at least will inspire you to pull out that camping gear, putting the convertible top down, and hitting the open road. These rides can be cross-county ( Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle ), on the freeway ( Dog , Sideways ), trekking across a few state lines ( Little Miss Sunshine , Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas ), hitting a new time zone ( Road Trip ), or even runnin’ coast-to-coast ( Rat Race , Transamerica ). Even the Academy has felt the need for reasonable speed, awarding Best Picture to both Green Book and Nomadland . Carpool lane? Of course: we’ve got an Oscar strapped in the passenger seat!

So whether you’re looking for a map to a long summer drive or fixing a flat in your life, turn to these essential 25 road trip movies of the last 25 years (in chronological order)!

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998) 51%

The Straight Story (1999) 95%

Tumbleweeds (1999) 82%

Almost Famous (2000) 91%

Road Trip (2000) 57%

Rat Race (2001) 45%

Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle (2004) 75%

Sideways (2004) 97%

Transamerica (2005) 77%

Little Miss Sunshine (2006) 91%

Cars (2006) 75%

Zombieland (2009) 89%

Away We Go (2009) 67%

Paul (2011) 70%

We're the Millers (2013) 48%

Chef (2014) 87%

Grandma (2015) 91%

Mississippi Grind (2015) 91%

Pee-wee's Big Holiday (2016) 83%

Green Book (2018) 77%

Nomadland (2020) 93%

The Mitchells vs. the Machines (2021) 97%

Bad Trip (2021) 79%

Dog (2022) 77%

Joy Ride (2023) 90%

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The 20 Best Road Movies of All Time, Ranked

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Being on the road is a great way to manifest a character's spiritual or emotional journey into the physical, as a way to symbolize the obstacles and lessons that come with pursing some goal or dream.

From offbeat comedies to allegorical dramas, here are the best road movies that use the road to teach, challenge, and unite their characters.

20. Planes, Trains and Automobiles (1987)

Directed by John Hughes

Starring Steve Martin, John Candy, Laila Robins

Comedy, Drama (1h 33m)

7.6 on IMDb — 92% on RT

As you might guess from the title, Planes, Trains and Automobiles isn't exactly confined to the road—it also takes to train tracks and even the skies at one point.

Still, at its core, the film centers on the journey shared by two bickering strangers who spend three days wrestling their way to Chicago for Thanksgiving Day.

Steve Martin and John Candy star as the tightly wound marketing exec and his irritating-but-lovable travel mate, for whom just about everything goes wrong.

Planes, Trains and Automobiles is a feel-good comedy classic, directed by the renowned John Hughes. If you enjoyed his other hits like The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller's Day Off , you'll like this one!

19. Queen & Slim (2019)

Directed by Melina Matsoukas

Starring Daniel Kaluuya, Jodie Turner-Smith, Bokeem Woodbine

Crime, Drama, Romance (2h 12m)

7.1 on IMDb — 83% on RT

Queen & Slim may not itself be a true story, but it's certainly inspired by all kinds of real news headlines, including the tragic 2012 shooting of Trayvon Martin in Florida.

Released at an important moment—just prior to the Black Lives Matter protests that broke out across the globe in 2020— Queen & Slim tells the gritty story of a Tinder date gone awry.

Starring Daniel Kaluuya and Jodie Turner-Smith, their Tinder date is intercepted by a white cop and... well... you can probably guess the rest.

Melina Matsoukas's glossy directorial debut isn't simply a matter of style or substance, because it's dripping with both.

18. The Rover (2014)

Directed by David Michôd

Starring Guy Pearce, Robert Pattinson, Scoot McNairy

Action, Crime, Drama (1h 43m)

6.4 on IMDb — 67% on RT

An Australian Western set in the near-future, The Rover hums with an eerie atmosphere of desertion.

Ten years after economic collapse, the Australian outback becomes a lawless space for a rugged drifter (played by Guy Pearce) to hunt down a gang of thieves. Left behind with him is an injured, simple-minded young American (brilliantly played by Robert Pattinson).

Robberies and shootouts interrupt the tensely quiet landscape of David Michôd's road drama, in which everybody is only out for themselves.

17. On the Road (2012)

Directed by Walter Salles

Starring Sam Riley, Garrett Hedlund, Kristen Stewart

Adventure, Drama, Romance (2h 4m)

6.0 on IMDb — 45% on RT

Jack Kerouac's On the Road is the be-all and end-all road trip novel, inspired by the Beat author's own skint, boozy, and spontaneous life during the 1940s.

It encompasses everything that being "on the road" means, going beyond just the physical to explore a "road that must eventually lead to the whole world." Walter Salles's film adaptation tries to capture all of that.

For Sal Paradise (played by Sam Riley) and Dean Moriarty (played by Garrett Hedlund), life on the move means: scribbling on diner napkins between highs, psychedelic mind expansion, winking, drinking, and getting dizzy with dancing.

It's endless horizons and endless rampages, all across an America that's steeped in twilight, moonshine, or golden hour.

16. Bones and All (2022)

Directed by Luca Guadagnino

Starring Timothée Chalamet, Taylor Russell, Mark Rylance

Drama, Horror, Romance (2h 11m)

6.8 on IMDb — 82% on RT

Lee (played by Timothée Chalamet) might look like a grungy teen runaway who just gets stoned and preaches Marxism for fun, but he's actually rugged-looking by necessity.

As it turns out, being a cannibal (or "eater") isn't easy to pull off in normal society, so Lee has no choice but to live loose and streetwise.

Maren (played by Taylor Russell), having recently figured out that she's also an eater, is new to this environment. When the two collide in a Indiana store, they decide to go cross-country in search for Maren's estranged mother.

Luca Guadagnino nonchalantly combines cannibalism with artsy, coming-of-age romance in his one-of-a-kind horror, where everything seems foreground to a perfect dusk.

15. Rain Man (1988)

Directed by Barry Levinson

Starring Dustin Hoffman, Tom Cruise, Valeria Golino

Drama (2h 13m)

8.0 on IMDb — 89% on RT

Materialistic businessman Charlie Babbitt (played by Tom Cruise) is in the midst of importing Lamborghinis to Los Angeles when his father dies. After driving over to Cincinnati, he finds his inheritance has gone to an unnamed trustee—who turns out to be an estranged older brother.

Charlie decides to take full custody of Raymond (played by Dustin Hoffman)—who has autism and savant syndrome—but it turns out a lot trickier than Charlie imagined.

Raymond refuses to fly, so they're forced to drive towards their deadline, all while juggling Raymond's demanding routines. Rain Man is a touching and iconic drama from Barry Levinson.

14. Nebraska (2013)

Directed by Alexander Payne

Starring Bruce Dern, Will Forte, June Squibb

Drama (1h 55m)

7.7 on IMDb — 91% on RT

Alexander Payne's Oscar-nominated comedy-drama Nebraska was the final film to be released by Paramount Vantage, the "art cinema" sector of Paramount Pictures that closed down in 2014.

Shot in black-and-white, Nebraska follows a cantankerous old man who believes he's won a million-dollar sweepstakes prize. Of course, the whole thing is a scam.

Nonetheless, Woody (played by Bruce Dern) takes his disgruntled son David (played by Will Forte) and embarks on a road trip to Nebraska, during which David finally uncovers the man beneath the hardened alcoholic that is his father.

13. American Honey (2016)

Directed by Andrea Arnold

Starring Sasha Lane, Shia LaBeouf, Riley Keough

Adventure, Drama, Romance (2h 43m)

7.0 on IMDb — 79% on RT

In order to find an actress for the starring role of her next troubled teen drama, filmmaker Andrea Arnold took to the streets and carnivals during spring break rather than relying on professional casting calls.

This approach perfectly matches the rugged and spontaneous tone of American Honey , in which a gang of hitchhikers and criminals surf the roads as a traveling sales crew.

The brilliant Sasha Lane stars as Star (no pun intended), who ditches her abusive father after she spots Jake (played by Shia LaBeouf) in a van full of misfits and decides to join them.

12. The Darjeeling Limited (2007)

Directed by Wes Anderson

Starring Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody, Jason Schwartzman

Adventure, Comedy, Drama (1h 31m)

7.2 on IMDb — 69% on RT

Okay, we're cheating a little bit with this one. The Darjeeling Limited is technically a train movie, but it shares a lot in common with road movies when you step back and look at what it is.

The Darjeeling Limited is a unique and elevated take on road movies, following the same principles but sprinkled with all kinds of Wes Anderson fun, including his trademark aesthetics.

Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody, and Jason Schwartzman star as three brothers who are reunited one year after their father's funeral. Bold colors saturate the screen as Anderson litters the brothers' journey of self-discovery with funny gags, cool camera angles, and touching moments.

11. Into the Wild (2007)

Directed by Sean Penn

Starring Emile Hirsch, Vince Vaughn, Catherine Keener

Adventure, Biography, Drama (2h 28m)

8.1 on IMDb — 83% on RT

After graduating college, Christopher McCandless snips his credit cards and donates all his belongings to Oxfam, then hits the road without the approval of his parents.

What begins on the wheels of his rundown Datsun 210 turns into hitchhiking, kayaking, swimming, walking, railroading, camping, and occasionally working his way towards Alaska: his dream destination, hidden in the wild.

Played by Emile Hirsch, Christopher "Alexander Supertramp" McCandless yearns to break free from the suburbs of a materialistic society, but ends up flying too close to the sun and getting burnt. Sean Penn poetically directs this true story for the big screen.

10. Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

Directed by Arthur Penn

Starring Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway, Michael J. Pollard

Action, Biography, Crime (1h 51m)

7.7 on IMDb — 90% on RT

A 1960s cult classic that broke many cinematic taboos, Bonnie and Clyde went down as one of the most iconic (and bloodiest for the time) films in history. We all know the legend about this couple who went on an infamous 21-month crime spree during the 1930s, right?

Director Arthur Penn breathes life into the myth by combining elements of slapstick comedy with gory violence and experimental filmmaking techniques, heavily influenced by the French New Wave.

Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway star as the robbing couple, who decide to steal their way out of the Great Depression.

9. Badlands (1973)

Directed by Terrence Malick

Starring Martin Sheen, Sissy Spacek, Warren Oates

Action, Crime, Drama (1h 34m)

7.7 on IMDb — 97% on RT

Terrence Malick's neo-noir film Badlands doesn't just follow a crime spree—it kicks things up to another level.

Instead of robbing banks, young couple Holly (played by Sissy Spacek) and Kit (played by Martin Sheen) become serial killers. Spacek narrates the movie as the duo are chased by the law across the Midwest.

Malick's directorial debut received widespread critical acclaim and is loosely based on the real-life 1958 murder spree of Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate.

8. Stranger Than Paradise (1984)

Directed by Jim Jarmusch

Starring John Lurie, Eszter Balint, Richard Edson

Comedy, Drama (1h 29m)

7.4 on IMDb — 96% on RT

Jim Jarmusch is a big name in independent circles, and he put himself on the map with Stranger Than Paradise back in the 1980s.

At first glance, Stranger Than Paradise could easily be mistaken for a French New Wave drama, but really it's an American absurdist comedy that just happens to be shot in grainy black-and-white.

Jarmusch's debut film also follows the French New Wave's tendency to meander through an indescribable plot.

In a loose sense, it's about Willie (played by John Lurie), his Hungarian cousin (played by Eszter Balint), and his friend (played by Richard Edson) as they bounce from Brooklyn to Cleveland to Florida.

Stranger Than Paradise is comprised of long, naturalistic takes that dawdle on the mundane and search beyond it—in a funny way.

7. Paris, Texas (1984)

Directed by Wim Wenders

Starring Harry Dean Stanton, Nastassja Kinski, Dean Stockwell

Drama (2h 25m)

8.1 on IMDb — 94% on RT

Co-produced by French and West German companies, the award-winning film Paris, Texas paints a European portrait of the American Southwest.

Wim Wenders's indie drama, which won the Palme d'Or, follows a mysterious vagabond (played by Harry Dean Stanton) who's found dissociated in the desert.

His estranged brother agrees to pick him up from Texas and soon ends up driving him to find his long-missing wife.

Stills of the sparse Texan outback are woven throughout Wenders's slow-burning drama, which relies on visuals more than heavy dialogue.

6. Nomadland (2020)

Directed by Chloé Zhao

Starring Frances McDormand, David Strathairn, Linda May

Drama (1h 47m)

7.3 on IMDb — 93% on RT

Based on Jessica Bruder's 2017 book Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century , Chloé Zhao's Nomadland won multiple Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Actress.

Frances McDormand's award-winning performance as a widow who lives an itinerate lifestyle is painted against the sweeping backdrop of the Arizonian desert.

Nomadland is a poetic, restless, and beautifully shot drama that will have you yearning for the van life where home isn't just a static place or word but "something you carry with you."

5. Almost Famous (2000)

Directed by Cameron Crowe

Starring Billy Crudup, Patrick Fugit, Kate Hudson

Adventure, Comedy, Drama (2h 2m)

7.9 on IMDb — 89% on RT

Almost Famous is the semi-autobiographical tale of a young music journalist who goes on tour with fictitious rock band Stillwater.

On behalf of Rolling Stone magazine, William Miller (played by Patrick Fugit) joins the motley crew of rockers and groupies to write an article on the band.

Take a peek behind the curtain of the 70s music scene, where tensions rise between fans and musicians, between the people who live music and the people who watch from the sidelines.

Directed by Cameron Crowe and starring Kate Hudson, Almost Famous is your classic coming-of-age tale.

4. Y Tu Mamá También (2002)

Directed by Alfronso Cuarón

Starring Maribel Verdú, Gael García Bernal, Diego Luna

Drama (1h 46m)

7.7 on IMDb — 92% on RT

Alfonso Cuarón is best-known for directing Children of Men , Roma , and the best Harry Potter movie. Yet, despite his Westernized filmography, Cuarón is a Mexican filmmaker, and Y Tu Mamá También is his greatest native movie to date.

Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna star as two fidgety teen boys who are itching to explore the world, themselves, and the opposite sex. They find all of these things at Boca del Cielo ("Heaven's Mouth"), a beach they visit with an older woman (played by Maribel Verdú).

Cuarón shows us the dusty roads of rural Mexico, where the trio set off with no idea how to reach this supposed Heaven. Drunk and excitable on the road there, the three return home in silence...

3. Little Miss Sunshine (2006)

Directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris

Starring Steve Carell, Toni Collette, Greg Kinnear

Comedy, Drama (1h 41m)

7.8 on IMDb — 91% on RT

Husband-and-wife collaborations are rare for film directors, but Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris showed that it can be successful with their stunning feature film directorial debut, Little Miss Sunshine .

Greg Kinnear, Steve Carell, Toni Collette, Paul Dano, and Abigail Breslin star in this sprightly colored tragicomedy, which plonks us in a bright yellow Microbus for a trip from New Mexico to California.

A mute son, a suicidal brother, a heroin-addicted father-in-law, and a failed life coach husband all make Sheryl Hoover's life more than chaotic. And when her young daughter earns a spot in the Little Miss Sunshine pageant, all hell breaks loose.

2. Thelma & Louise (1991)

Directed by Ridley Scott

Starring Susan Sarandon, Geena Davis, Harvey Keitel

Adventure, Crime, Drama (2h 10m)

7.5 on IMDb — 86% on RT

The fact that Thelma & Louise was initially criticized for its "negative portrayal of men" speaks volumes about it as a heralded feminist flick.

A female buddy movie that echoes the legend of Bonnie and Clyde, Thelma & Louise tracks two best friends as they drive toward the mountains for a much-needed vacation.

Susan Sarandon, Geena Davis, Brad Pitt, and Harvey Keitel make up the cast in this cat-and-mouse chase across the American Southwest, in which the FBI tails the polar-opposite, store-robbing besties.

1. Easy Rider (1969)

Directed by Dennis Hopper

Starring Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper, Jack Nicholson

Adventure, Drama (1h 35m)

7.3 on IMDb — 84% on RT

Easy Rider isn't just a great movie—it's an emblem of 1960s counterculture. It marks the dawn of New Hollywood, when filmmakers started moving away from the studio system and started stepping into more radical and experimental independence.

Simply put, Easy Rider made a huge impact on the world of Western cinema, despite being made on a tiny budget.

Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper (who also directs) bolt around on their motorbikes as they smuggle cocaine from Mexico into Los Angeles. Hippy communes and bad acid trips punctuate their journey, which is all set to a groovy Jimi Hendrix soundtrack.

Buckle Up and Check Out the Cast of Road Trip Then and Now

It's been 20 years since four college kids piled into the car and embarked on a tour of debauchery for a ridiculous cause in todd phillips' feature directorial debut.

How do we top Jason Biggs doing it with a pie...?

Such was surely the question on countless filmmakers' lips after the box office success of  American Pie , which spurred the urge to fill theaters with debauched hi-jinks that young gentlemen especially would find funny.

Todd Phillips  perfected that formula over the course of the 00s, and he started with 2000's  Road Trip , a raunchy gross-out fest cranked up to 11 about a fairly normal college student played by Breckin Meyer who hits the road to intercept a sex tape of him and a one-night stand that was accidentally mailed to his girlfriend, played by Rachel Blanchard , who's at another school. And of course he wouldn't embark on such an important mission alone...

Sex is had between expected and unexpected partners, a prostate is probed, French toast gets a dusting of flop sweat, a mouse is molested by Tom Green . Phillips, who also wrote the story with Scot Armstrong , packed it all in, and even borrowed Stifler from what would soon be a whole  American Pie  franchise for the ride.

"I find the term 'gross-out comedy' sort of dismissive," Phillips, ready to go to bat for whatever he was working on since the beginning, told the BBC in 2000. "It's very easy to be gross, it's very hard to be funny. I think why Road Trip  works is not because of the gross stuff, it's because of the characters."

And since 20 years is a bit of time, definitely enough time for a few twists and turns on everybody's journey, let's get a load of what these miscreants all looked like then vs. now:

After standing out as Travis Birkenstock in  Clueless  and scoring supporting roles in  The Craft ,  Go and  The Insider , Meyer moved into the starring position in  Road Trip as Josh—a cheater (it all works out in the end) but the relatively nice, normal one of the bunch. Next up was the ensemble comedy  Rat Race  and he's the voice of Jon in the  Garfield movies with Bill Murray as the lazy, lasagna-loving cat. A regular in movies and TV, Meyer also starred in the legal dramedy  Franklin & Bash with Mark-Paul Gosselaar  and more recently appeared in Designated Survivor  and  The Fix .

He has two daughters with ex-wife Deborah Kaplan (who directed him in 2001's  Josie and the Pussycats ) and since 2017 he's been in a relationship with  The Bold and the Beautiful  actress Linsey Gofrey after they met on a dating app for people in the industry.

"I always tell him all the time, I'm like, 'I had the biggest crush on you when I was growing up. I loved Travis from Clueless,'"  Godfrey told  Soap Opera Digest   in December 2018. "And I loved him in Road Trip and all that kind of stuff. He thinks that's really funny and I think it's really funny. He was adorable and we both have big crushes on each other. He's the best!"

He had just played Stiffler in  American Pie and would have three more turns as the unhinged but well-meaning party animal down the road, but first—Josh's best friend, the mildly unhinged but well-meaning party animal E.L., in  Road Trip .

Scott dove into his subsequent type-casting with relish, starring in the bromance classic  Dude, Where's My Car?  with Ashton Kutcher and  Final Destination  (both of which also came out in 2000),  The Dukes of Hazzard ,  Mr. Woodcock and  Role Models . He also turned up in  Old School  and  Jay and Silent Bob Strikes Back and  provided the voice of Crash in four  Ice Age films. He has also starred in a number of small films, including the ensemble sci-fi thriller-comedy  Southland Tales (audiences didn't really get it either) and the Courteney Cox-directed  Just Before I Go .

He actually hasn't done much TV (his movies have quietly grossed almost $5 billion collectively in the meantime), but in 2018 was cast in Fox's  Lethal Weapon to replace the fired Clayne Crawford as the resident live wire, but the buddy-cop dramedy was canceled at the end of its third season.

Having maintained an impressively private personal life for two decades, Williams married interior designer  Olivia Korenberg  in September 2019.

Beth turned out to be the girl for Josh in the end, never mind the shady cinematic start to their relationship.

After  Road Trip , which was preceded by modeling, starring in  Varsity Blues  and playing Ruby on  Felicity , Smart reunited with Breckin Meyer in  Rat Race and co-starred in  The Butterfly Effect with Ashton Kutcher . She has appeared in a slew of films, including  Win a Date With Tad Hamilton , Starsky & Hutch ,  The Best Man ,  Just Friends (as the object of Ryan Reynolds ' long-suffering affection),  The Town and the holiday ABC Family classic  12 Dates of Christmas . Later TV work has included  Maron ,  Law & Order: SVU ,  MacGyver  and the new DC Universe web series  Stargirl with Luke Wilson , which just premiered May 18, 2020.

Smart married HGTV star Carter Oosterhouse in 2011 and they welcomed daughter Flora via surrogate in 2016.

Josh's smart-ass pal Rubin is the reason this road trip was possible, as he's the one who sent the wrong tape (Josh had also been recording innocent video messages in the era before FaceTime and Snapchat) to Josh's girlfriend, Tiffany.

Costanzo went on to co-star in 40 Days and 40 Nights with Josh Hartnett and then landed the technically plum role of Joey 's nephew Michael Tribbiani in the ultimately short-lived  Friends  spin-off. A steadier gig came as a star of the USA dramedy  Royal Pains for eight seasons, after which he had a pivotal role in the HBO series  The Night Of and joined the cast of  Designated Survivor  in season two.

Green's bum isn't on the road trip, but his character—Barry Manilow—serves as narrator and school bard. 2000 was an eventful year for the host of  The Tom Green Show— he chronicled his successful treatment for testicular cancer on his popular MTV show, and then appeared as The Chad in  Charlie's Angels  alongside then-girlfriend Drew Barrymore , whom he was married to for eight months in 2001 before filing for divorce that December.

After  Road Trip , his biggest movie was 2001's  Freddy Got Fingered , but he has written and produced and appeared in all sorts of productions over the years (including Tom Green's House Tonight , an ahead-of-his-time talk show he filmed in his living room, and Tom Green Live ), as well as done cameos and a lot of voice work.

The meek and scrawny Kyle was a sight gag in and of himself, but though he had some lows (eating adulterated French toast being the most memorable), he also ended up with Rhonda's leopard-print underpants as a souvenir from the best night of his life to date.

After  Road Trip , his movie debut, Qualls starred in his own bro comedy, 2002's  The New Guy , but is mainly known for supporting appearances in the likes of Hustle & Flow  and TV shows including  Lost ,  Criminal Minds ,  My Name Is Earl ,  The Big Bang Theory ,  Breaking Bad ,  Supernatural ,  Fargo and  The Man in the High Castle , on which he was a regular for three seasons. 

He also reprised the role of Kylie in 2009's direct-to-DVD sequel  Road Trip: Beer Pong .

After sharing with an audience that he was gay during one of his pal Jim Jeffries ' stand-up shows (in 2013 Qualls starred in  Legit , a sitcom co-created by Jeffries), Qualls took to Twitter in January 2020 to write , "It is 11:20pm. I just came out on stage at a @jimjefferies show in San Diego. Yep, I'm gay. Been gay this whole time. Tired of worrying about what people would think of me. Tired of worrying about what it would do to my career."

None of the aftermath of Rhonda's memorable sex scene, when Kyle's friends tease him, aged well, but Davis made a splash as the confident, sexy-as-hell girl Kyle loses his virginity to on the road. The model and actress went on to a career as a motivational speaker and style consultant before she died at 36 in 2011 from a pulmonary embolism following knee surgery. She was married to comedian Mike Yard from 2008 until her death.

Perfectly nice Tiffany remains none the wiser about Josh's unfaithful ways after the tape turns out  not to be what Josh thought it was, and they amicably split up.

Blanchard, the former child star ( The Kids of Degrassi Street , Are   You Afraid of the Dark? ) who played Cher when  Clueless was briefly a sitcom, has since worked alongside a slew of talented actors, but her most recognizable film since  Road Trip  is the instant-cult-classic  Snakes on a Plane . Up next, however, she's in Adrian Lyne 's thriller  Deep   Water , the film that brought co-stars Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas together off-camera, due out in November 2020.

Her TV work includes  7th Heaven ,  Peep Show ,  Psych ,  Fargo and Audience Network's  You Me Her , which has been renewed for a fifth and final season.

In 2014, Blanchard told ABC News that anything online saying she had a husband named Adrian Brown and two kids was a lie. "That's a rumor," she said. "I think I have an Internet stalker, who started that and then won't take it down. I keep having it taken down and he keeps putting it back up. But I don't have a husband, I don't have two kids."

She has since married composer Jeremy Turner and they have a daughter, Maxine.

The star of stage and screen who originated the role of Mark in  Rent  and Lucas in If/Then  on Broadway can play a chilling villain, see anti-Semite McGoo in  School Ties  and Josh, obsessive TA turned cult leader, in  Road Trip . He's appeared in numerous indie films over the years, as well as bigger fare such as  A Beautiful Mind  and the 2005 movie adaptation of  Rent , and his more recent TV work includes  Psych ,  The Knick ,  The Good Fight  and  13 Reasons Why . He currently stars on CBS All Access'  Star Trek: Discovery  as Lt. Commander Paul Stamets.

In 2017, Rapp changed the course of a lot of things when he said in an interview that Kevin Spacey had made a sexual advance toward him when he was 14 and Spacey was 26, which triggered a spiral of accusations  that resulted in Spacey being fired from  House of Cards . (Spacey said he didn't remember doing any such thing, but if he did so while drunk, he was deeply sorry.)

"I felt bad for the hundreds of people who were working on the show," Rapp said a year later, reflecting on how swiftly Spacey's career collapsed after he came forward. The actor told BuzzFeed he was "relieved" when  House of Cards returned for another season without Frank Underwood.

In November 2019, Rapp announced that he was engaged to his partner,  Ken Ithiphol .

The before-and-after of the prominent character actor never gets old. Suplee had already excelled at comedy (the only one who can't see the optical illusion in Mallrats ;   a high school bully's strongman in Boy Meets World ) and drama (as  Edward Norton 's racist lump of a friend in  American History X ) by the time he had a small role in Road Trip  as Ed. He was played a high school football player in  Remember the Titans in 2000 and went on to co-star in  My Name Is Earl  from 2005 to 2009. His film resume includes  The Butterfly Effect ,  Cold Mountain , Unstoppable ,  The Wolf of Wall Street ,  Deepwater Horizon and the Norton-directed  Motherless Brooklyn ,   and more recent TV work includes Hulu's  Chance , the new  Twin Peaks , and Netflix's  The Ranch  and  The Santa Clarita Diet .

He has four children with Brandy Lewis , his wife since 2006, and in January 2020—after almost a lifetime of yo-yo dieting and gaining and losing hundreds of pounds—he proudly revealed off his new muscled physique

The  News Radio  star and all-around quirky fellow had a brief cameo as an obviously strange motel clerk.

Amid several arrests over the years, some of them involving indecent exposure and groping other men, Dick has been open about struggling with substance abuse that has had him in and out of rehab. But despite the toxic behavior, he has stayed busy, having his own sketch show,  The Andy Dick Show , on MTV for a couple years; becoming a regular on the dais at celebrity roasts; releasing a few comedy albums; and doing a lot of cameos as an oddball in the likes of  Community , Maron ,  Workaholics and Netflix's  Sense8 . 

Dick has a son from his first marriage, to Ivone Kowalczyk, and a son and daughter with partner Lena Sved—who obtained a restraining order against Dick in 2018, claiming he had gotten belligerent in front of their son, who in turn locked his drunken father out of the house.

As "French Toast Guy," an otherwise unnamed diner cook, he amiably agreed to give Kyle a new plate of French toast  without powdered sugar, and proceeded to remove the sugar in every obscene way imaginable and serve it back to him.

Sanz had joined the cast of  Saturday Night Live  in 1998 and stayed until 2006, while also building a resume of small but standout comedic roles in the likes of  Boat Trip, School for Scoundrels, Lucky You, Step Brothers, Year One and Bachelorette. He's also the voice of Duncan in Wreck-It-Ralph and Ralph Breaks the Internet . His acting on TV has included  30 Rock ,  House of Lies ,  Parks and Recreation ,  Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt ,  Modern Family ,  Scorpion ,  GLOW  and  The Mandalorian .

In 2008 he revealed that he'd lost about 100 pounds, and later said on The Tonight Show that he'd been working out more and cut out alcohol.

Sanz is quiet about his persona life, but he married his wife Jenn in 2015.

A prolific improv comedian and star of  Mr. Show  and  The Larry Sanders Show  long before she became the unflappable IT wiz Chloe O'Brian on  24 , Rajskub had a quick turn in  Road Trip  as school bus dispatcher Blind Brenda whose intuition (and middle finger) works just fine.

Road Trip was just an early stop on the journey for Phillips, who got his start making documentaries ( Frat House put him on the map) and then went on to direct and/or write Old School ,  Starsky & Hutch ,  School for Scoundrels ,  The Hangover  (as well as  Part II  and  Part III ),  Due Date , War Dogs and  Joker . He also produced  A Star Is Born with longtime buddy Bradley Cooper, who in turn was a co-producer on  Joker , which was nominated for 11 Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director. Joaquin Phoenix won Best Actor (as well as every other major award), and  Hildur Guðnadóttir won for Best Original Score.

"I'm writing another comedy," Phillips told the BBC in 2000. "But don't worry, it's not a teen movie at all." Just adults who start a fraternity, that's all, and it's spectacular.

Road Trip made almost $120 million worldwide and put Phillips on the dude-comedy map—though, as he would be quick to point out, each of those dudes has a purpose.

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Tom Green's film debut casts him as a perpetual college student narrating the raucous odyssey of four university buddies as they make their way from Ithaca, N.Y., to Austin. Their goal: retrieve an illicit video, which was mailed by mistake. Breckin Meyer, Seann William Scott, Amy Smart, Paulo Costanzo, DJ Qualls, Rachel Blanchard.

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The 10 Best Road Trip Movies, from ‘It Happened One Night’ to ‘Easy Rider’

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A good road trip is one of the most cinematic experiences that a person can have in real life. Different cities and landscapes blur together as scenery flies by your windows and day gradually turns into night. The car can begin to feel like an isolated bubble where nothing matters except the people inside. Whether you’re laughing and singing with friends, fighting with your family, or simply letting your thoughts settle while you drive solo, road trips seem to stop time and create distinct memories that can be revisited over and over again .  

So it’s not surprising that filmmakers have been inspired by road trips for as long as there have been movies. From the titans of the Old Hollywood studio system to international arthouse auteurs and contemporary independent directors, virtually every great filmmaker has tried their hand at a road trip movie at one point or another. Locations and genres can change, but the motif of people going from one place to another in a car is one of the building blocks of the international language of cinema.  

Road trip movies are versatile enough to encompass a wide variety of subject matter, but they often fall into two genres: comedies and contemplative dramas. The road trip comedy is a Hollywood standard because its built-in structure (characters need to get somewhere in a finite amount of time and are stuck together in a small space) lends itself to endless funny scenarios. From disgruntled fathers driving their badly-behaved children to strangers who fall in love after being forced to travel together, cars serve as confined spaces that allow a variety of relationships to flourish. On the other end of the spectrum, you have dramas from auteurs like Wim Wenders and Ingmar Bergman that see the road as a place for humans to think. Those films prioritize the destination much less than the self-discovery that can take place when you’re not in any particular rush to get somewhere.  

The road trip movie has endured for over a century, and its timeless appeal means that it’s unlikely to disappear any time soon. Keep reading for ten of our favorites, listed in chronological order.  

“It Happened One Night” (1934)

What It Is:  The archetypal Hollywood romantic comedy, Frank Capra’s “It Happened One Night” stars Claudette Colbert as pampered socialite Ellie, who boards a Greyhound bus from Florida to New York City to reunite with her new husband, pilot King Westley (Jameson Thomas), after her father attempts to annul the marriage. Unused to fending for herself, she ends up relying on the help of sarcastic newspaper reporter Peter (Clark Gable) to make the journey, despite despising his personality. At least at first — hitchhiking adventures and stays in motels quickly cause sparks to fly between the mismatched pair.

Perfect For:  Couples looking for date night films, “Looney Tunes” fans who want to watch the Gable performance that inspired Bugs Bunny, and lovers of pretty much every romantic comedy made in the last nine decades. —WC

“Wild Strawberries” (1957)

What It Is:  Not exactly the fun road trip romp the genre usually promises, “Wild Strawberries” uses a long car ride as the backdrop for a surreal exploration of aging, loneliness, and death. Ingmar Bergman’s film stars Victor Sjöström as cold-hearted professor Isak Borg, who is set to receive a lifetime achievement award for his career in bacteriology. On the drive to the university where the ceremony will take place, he’s accompanied by his pregnant daughter-in-law Marianne (Ingrid Thulin) and a group of young hitchhikers — one of whom is a double in looks and name for his childhood sweetheart Sara (played by Bibi Andersson). Over the course of the trip, Isak slowly warms to his younger companions, and experiences a series of flashbacks and dreams that forces him to confront the impending end of his life and his many regrets from his empty existence.

Perfect For:  Existential types, dying old men, and those whose only exposure to Bergman’s films are the HBO “Scenes From a Marriage” remake and the chess scene from “Seventh Seal.” —WC

“Easy Rider” (1969)

What It Is : A counterculture classic, Dennis Hopper’s “Easy Rider” stars the director and Peter Fonda as two drug-smuggling motorcyclists on a journey from Los Angeles to New Orleans, where they’re hoping to celebrate Mardi Gras. Along the road, they encounter a colorful cast of hippies, free love commune residents, addicts, prostitutes, and other outsiders. Their free-wheeling adventures are contrasted by the judgment they face from small town types and law enforcement looking to lock them up.

Perfect For:  Rebels, stoners, general miscreants everywhere, and fans of the iconic rock bands like The Byrds, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, and Steppenwolf that soundtrack the film. —WC

“Two-Lane Blacktop” (1971)

What It Is: “Two Lane Blacktop” is so clearly a product of its time that we could never hope to reverse engineer it. But when watched in 2023, it’s a fascinating countercultural artifact and a remnant of a film industry that now looks completely unrecognizable. Monte Hellman’s portrait of youthful angst and the freedom of the open road stars James Taylor and Beach Boys drummer Dennis Wilson as speed-obsessed drifters whose encounter with a mysterious driver named GTO prompts them to embark on a cross-country race.

Who It’s For:  Anyone with a need for speed and pop culture geeks who enjoy seeing famous non-actors trying to act. —CZ

“Paris, Texas” (1984)

What It Is: After making a name for himself in the German arthouse scene with his Road Movie Trilogy consisting of “Alice in the Cities,” “The Wrong Move,” and “Kings of the Road,” Wim Wenders brought his brand of contemplative cinema to America and made his magnum opus. “Paris, Texas” tells the story of a broken man (Harry Dean Stanton) wandering through the desert before his brother finds him and convinces him to reconnect with the family he walked out on. Wenders continued to find poetry in the loneliness of the road, and the desolate American scenery and Stanton’s heartbreakingly expressive face ended up being the best muses of his career. 

Perfect For:  Fans of slow cinema and anyone looking to brush up on the 20th century’s most impressive works of filmmaking. —CZ

“Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure” (1985)

What It Is: After developing a cult following from his stage show at the Roxy, Paul Reubens brought his comedic persona known as Pee-Wee Herman to the big screen in a whimsical road trip comedy directed by a young animator named Tim Burton. The film sees the idiosyncratic man-child traveling across the country to recover his stolen bike — and using his charm and joie de vivre to defuse conflicts with all of the shady characters he meets along the way. 

Perfect for: Loners, rebels, and anyone who wants to revisit the work of a comedic genius at the height of his powers. —CZ

“Planes, Trains, and Automobiles” (1987)

What It Is:  John Hughes’ holiday classic stars Steve Martin and John Candy as a mismatched pair of travelers who team up to make it home to Chicago for Thanksgiving. Martin’s suave ad executive constantly clashes with Candy’s bumbling shower curtain ring salesman as their cursed trip leads them onto — you guessed it — planes, trains, and automobiles in an attempt to get home before the holiday ends. Utterly ridiculous until it gets touching, the film is one of the strongest entries in the seemingly endless string of hits that Hughes churned out in the 1980s. 

Perfect For:  Families at Thanksgiving and anyone on a delayed flight who wants to remember that things could be so much worse. —CZ

“Thelma & Louise” (1991)

What It Is:  Ridley Scott and screenwriter Callie Khouri flipped the script on the conventional gender roles of the buddy comedy genre, opting to tell a story about two women having a blast while running from the law. Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis give career-best performances as the eponymous duo — and both picked up well-derved Oscar nominations for Best Actress. The film is best remembered for its shockingly bold ending, but stands out as one of the 20th century’s most vibrant portrayals of friendship and the highways of America.

Who It’s For:  Ridley Scott completionist s, feminist film scholars, and anyone in the mood for a great time. —CZ

“The Straight Story” (David Lynch, 1999)

What It Is: Perhaps the biggest anomaly in David Lynch’s filmography, “The Straight Story” saw the beloved auteur shifting away from surrealism to tell a G-rated story of a man who travels the country on a riding lawnmower. While the Disney movie doesn’t feature any of the twisted nightmares that define many of Lynch’s best works, it’s filled with the wholesome Americana imagery that appears throughout his filmography. The film is a reminder that for all of his signature stylistic flourishes, Lynch is a filmmaker whose grasp of the fundamentals allow him to tell compelling stories without hiding behind bells and whistles.

Perfect for:  Anyone whose favorite parts of “Twin Peaks” were the wholesome small town antics. —CZ

“Little Miss Sunshine” (2006)

What It Is:  One of the most darkly amusing road trip comedies in recent memory follows the plight of a dysfunctional family who takes an 800-mile road trip to support their daughter’s entry in the Little Miss Sunshine beauty pageant. Piling into a van that’s breaking down almost as rapidly as the familial ties that bind them, they find themselves confronting their delusional dreams and long-simmering resentments (and a horn that never stops honking). While “Little Miss Sunshine” is a classic example of the “Sundance road trip movie” trope that’s often maligned in indie film circles, there’s no denying that it’s one of the best entries in the subgenre. 

Perfect For:  Anyone who is beginning to question their belief that child beauty pageants are an unambiguous societal good. —CZ

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The basest definition of a road trip is simply this: a person or people moving across a great distance, usually in an automobile. Road trips, despite our romantic cultural idea of them, are usually unremarkable chores – moving (the worst), driving home for the holidays, heading to school, etc. Even when driving to a vacation, the travel usually ends up being the worst part. Exciting, sure; but eventually those trips drone, and drone, and drone and… are we there yet?

In cinema, though, road trips are important in ways that seldom match reality. Some are heroes’ journeys, transformative experiences that elevate characters or bring them to age. Others are farcical comedies of error, presenting hilarious roadblocks and setbacks that exist only in fiction. Some are both, and few are neither. Despite having tonal differences and unique genre elements, road trip movies constitute a category all themselves. This list is about the best of that category.

These are the 17 Greatest Road Trip Movies of All Time.

17. Road Trip

Road Trip is a time capsule, stuffed with what young adults found funny around start of the century. The film grossed $120 Million against a $16 million dollar budget, and the credits list includes names like Seann William Scott, Amy Smart, Fred Ward, and Tom Green. If those names don’t induce flashbacks, maybe the film’s plot will.

Road Trip is about a college kid who, as a way to maintain a long distance relationship with his girlfriend, films himself in daily video blogs. On tape . He then mails the tape – in the mail – across the country to his girlfriend. This system works fine, until a tape that captured the boyfriend’s infidelity is accidentally mailed. So he and his friends get in an car and drive across the country to try to intercept the tape.

The film is ultimately a forgettable entry in the road trip genre – it comes in last on the list, included because its premise is an homage to the road trip itself, and because its name is, well, Road Trip.

16. Zombieland

Some film road trips are quests of self-discovery. Some serve practical purposes, like recovering an accidental sex-tape or heading to vacation. Or running from zombies.

When Zombieland arrived in theaters in 2009, we saw a polar extreme of road trip insanity. Starring Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone, Jesse Eiesenberg, and Abigail Breslin, the film takes place in a world ravaged by the zombie apocalypse. These characters aren’t traversing the country on some field trip, they are desperately (and hilariously) seeking asylum - and twinkies.

As with any good road trip, barriers are broken down in the film, and relationships are formed.  When we first meet the protagonists of Zombieland , they identify themselves by birthplace exclusively (“ Hi, I’m Columbus ”) as a way to resist forming bonds, but by the end of the film romances spark and surprising friendships form. The film presents the road trip as a transformative event, with a satisfying emotional payoff. Plus a whole lot of zombies ( and maybe more to come) .

Borat : Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan , which we will call simply Borat moving forward, was either ahead of its time or timeless in its lampooning of xenophobia, homophobia, and jingoism in America. Sacha Baron Cohen plays the film's titular character, driving cross country to do two things: chronicle American culture, and find Pamela Anderson, who he saw on TV and is determined to take for a wife.

There’s a chance that whatever freshness or edginess  defined Borat when it released has been worn away, blunted by the bad impressions and recountings that were inescapable for a long time after the film’s initial release. But what Borat did as a road trip film was ingenious. By perverting the relationship between road trip and country (a relationship usually defined by discovery, and understanding), Sacha Baron Cohen turned a fun house mirror toward our national image. It was hilarious.

14. Mad Max: Fury Road

Fury Road is one of two things: it is either a stretched definition of “road trip”, or it is the apotheosis of “road trip”. We lean toward the latter. The film’s protagonists, Max (Tom Hardy) and Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron) do, in fact, complete two long journeys in a truck, and all the hallmarks of a film road trip are present. The pressures of travel reveal hidden truths about the characters, who both discover each other and discover themselves. Relationships are formed; others, more destructive, are shed.

That the “pressures of travel” in this case includes radiated war-boys launching fire spears into trucks, sandstorms destroying caravans, and one faceless man playing a flamethrower guitar do not in any way discount the road-trip tropes highlighted above. If anything, the unique perils of this particular trip reinforce what we love about travel films, at the same time adding some of the best action  films anyone has ever seen.

13. Into The Wild

Into The Wild doesn’t follow the normal road trip format, usually including one or more characters in a car on the way to wherever, only to discover that the trip itself was more important than the destination. For Into The Wild , and the film’s protagonist Chris McCandless (Emile Hirsch), the trip was never about anything other than the trip, destinations be damned.

In Into The Wild , McCandless strips himself of society’s strappings entirely, and resigns himself to travel wherever the wind blows. The film’s perspective is ultimately disturbing, but refreshingly original – what starts predictably as a paean to nature and a condemnation of society turns into a nightmare, as McCandless’ life comes to its conclusion, alone and afraid, having misjudged just how cruel nature could truly be.

The films’ finish is depressing and confounding, but it succeeds in playing sickly with our expectations of how road trips and retreats are supposed to work – the protagonist in this story may have found himself, but part of that discovery was just how unequipped he was to deal with his surroundings in the end.

12. Little Miss Sunshine

Little Miss Sunshine is the indie film that other indie films use as a success marker, after grossing $100 million at the box office against an $8-million-dollar budget and was nominated for four academy awards. Its easy to see how the film was so successful; it nimbly presents a funny and heartfelt story that could have easily been cloyingly sweet in the wrong hands.

The film follows a family, dysfunctional in their own way, that travels across the country to enter their youngest girl in a beauty pageant. The family consists of personalities that defy convenient descriptors. A teenage son, in the middle of a vow of silence until he becomes a test pilot. A scholarly brother, who also happens to be homosexual and is recovering from a suicide attempt. A grandfather, booted from his retirement home for snorting heroin.

The trip in Little Miss Sunshine brings the family together, moves them past the petty conflicts of the film’s early going. Instead of changing for one another, though, the family becomes galvanized around Abigail Breslin’s character, happy to be with each other even though they are all screwed up In one way or another.

11. Rain Man

It’s shocking now – with the tent pole culture that pervades our theaters – that Rain Man was the highest grossing film of 1988. But it was, with $354 million against a budget of twenty-five and four Oscar wins (including Best Picture and Best Actor) to boot. The film follows Tom Cruise as Charlie, a slick salesman with debts to pay. Charlie’s father passes away and leaves the family’s considerable wealth to Raymond (Dustin Hoffman), a brother Charlie never knew existed. Raymond is an autistic savant who is living at a mental institution at the film’s start.

The road trip in Rain Man is predictably transformative for Charlie, who starts the film as a slave to his own self-interest and finishes with a newfound perspective on what relationships can mean.  As the two brothers travel from Cincinnati to Los Angeles, hampered by the restrictions of Raymond’s condition, Charlie discovers his brother to be more than just a roadblock in front of the family fortune.

10. The Motorcycle Diaries

The Motorcycle Diaries is as much an ode to the road movie genre as it is a biopic of a young Che Guevara as he traverses the South American continent by, you guessed it, motorcycle. The film could have been a by-the-numbers historical recounting of a revolutionary in the making, but it instead takes a romantic stance toward the road trip as a transformation event. It’s poetic, while still historically accurate.

The film adapts the real life memoirs of Che Guevara, the story of his journey across South America during his last year of medical school. Ostensibly traveling to volunteer at a leper colony, Guevara and his riding partner are confronted with the disparity between the upper class that they belong to and the abject poverty that they discover along the way. The Motorcycle Diaries makes the road trip multifunctional – it is a tool of personal discovery, of chronicling a continent, and of forming a revolutionary.

9. Almost Famous

At the intersection of road movie and coming-of-age movie, you can find Cameron Crowe’s semi-autobiographical   Almost Famous , a story about a teenage rock and roll journalist and the band he is following.

At his best, Crowe is adept at toeing the line between oversweet sentimentality and sharp emotional resonance. Almost Famous is Crowe at his best. The film follows William Miller, a budding music critic with only fifteen years of life under his belt. He follows Stillwater - a band on the rise - across the country, discovering on the way what it feels like to fall in love, be accepted, make friends, be let down, be rejected, and be embarrassed. If the hallmark of road trip films is travel as a conduit for change, Almost Famous is that idea distilled down to its core.

A young Patrick Fugit gave depth and life to the main character of William, alongside a star studded cast including Kate Hudson in the role of Penny Lane, veteran groupie. All the characters in the tour bus are tainted, broken in one way or another, and yet they are all likeable. It makes for an intoxicating mixture of joy and sadness, and a trip that we would love to take.

8. Y Tu Mama Tambien

Y Tu Mama Tambien is a 2001 film directed by Alfonso Cuaron that follows two teenagers and a woman in her twenties as they traverse Mexico in search of a particular secluded beach. Cuaron would go on to direct giant, visionary films like Gravity and Children of Men , but Y Tu Mama Tambien is a small, ruthlessly intimate tale.

Some road trip films, specifically about young men discovering themselves, presents sexuality as an end goal, something worth traveling to discover. Not even sex, the act; just a character’s own sexuality, the threshold between boyhood and manhood. Y Tu Mama Tambien presents sexuality as a nuclear bomb. The two protagonists cling to their illicit history with women, and strive to sexualize themselves in the eyes of the world. That quest eventually destroys the foundation of their relationship, as they divulge corrosive truths about themselves and cross lines that cannot be uncrossed.

That summary may feel vague, because it is. The film itself is starkly explicit and frank in ways that we really can’t be here. Its presentation of sexuality is aggressively subversive, and it’s use of the road trip as a tool for that subversion is startling. It is a singular entry into the road movie genre, and one that will stay with you for a while after the trip has ended.

7. Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle

Harold and Kumar  Go to White Castle is road-trip-as-farce, with two titular characters that - after engaging in some recreational drug activity - decide to make the quest to White Castle for hamburgers. On its surface, the film is indistinct from other stoner comedies like Half Baked , How High, et al. What sets it apart is the film’s characters, which are fully realized and relatable, and the lead actors, who breathe life into a film that is otherwise constricted by the well-tread genre that defines it.

Harold and Kumar, played by John Cho and Kal Penn, are markedly different from the other slackers and underachievers that often populate comedies like this one. They are both second generation immigrants, and both relatively high achievers. The impetus for their drug-addled escapade isn’t arrested development. Instead, it’s the reality that maybe they don’t have agency over their lives at a crucial age. Kumar (Penn) must decide whether he wants to be a doctor, or whether he is fulfilling a destiny that he didn’t choose, a destiny that he also feels is completely ethnically unoriginal. Harold is a lonely investment banker, stagnating and in unrequited love with his neighbor.

The characters are easily relatable, have tangible feelings and goals, and are as such sympathetic figures to their audience. Like any good road movie, they change along the way, discovering their true desires and regaining power over their choices.

6. The Straight Story

The Straight Story is based on the true events surrounding Alvin Straight’s journey across Iowa and Wisconsin. The fact that Alvin’s journey takes place on a lawn mower is just the first in a series of distinctions between The Straight Story and other road trip films.

Richard Farnsworth stars as Alvin, an elderly man who lives with his daughter. He is visited with the news that his estranged brother has suffered a stroke, prompting Alvin to visit him before he dies and make amends. Alvin, saddled with the physical impairments that come with advanced age, can’t procure a driver’s license. So, determined, he makes the journey on his extremely slow lawn tractor.

David Lynch directed the film, shooting the entire movie along the actual route Alvin took to find his brother. The Straight Story was nominated for the palm d’or at Cannes film festival in 1999, and was released to nearly unanimous critical acclaim.  It stands apart from Lynch’s normally byzantine works , as an accessible and touching film – one that uses the road trip as a way for Alvin to meet numerous characters along the way and have heartfelt, meaningful interactions with each of them before eventually achieving his goal.

5. Vacation (1983)

Vacation is both outrageously funny and truly poignant in a way that few other films are. By now, the story is well known – Clark Griswald ( Chevy Chase ) is a harried and overmatched husband and father of two who wants only to provide a quality vacation for his family, one devoid of complications.

That Griswold is not a taskmaster, but rather a loving and caring dad and husband, only heightens the comic tragedy of the whole endeavor. Vacation ’s lesson is simple, and instantly relatable: no family is perfect, and nothing ever goes as planned. The canned experiences, the plastic amusement parks and hokey tourist traps aren’t what make family vacations memorable. It’s the diversions, the incidents that could only happen to your family, that make otherwise unremarkable experiences memorable.

Now, Vacation takes that idea to extreme heights, as any good comedy would.  Everything that can go wrong does go wrong, from the vehicle itself, to lost currency, car accidents, crazy relatives, and at least one dead dog. Clark drives himself to the brink of insanity trying to overcome this series of unfortunate events, only to find out that the family’s destination is not even open for business.

It was a blueprint that served for four more sequels, of varying quality. Vacation kept returning to the well, ultimately because we are all Griswalds to one degree or another.

4. Dumb and Dumber

Road trips rarely come funnier than Dumb and Dumber , a comedy of errors about two friends – Harry and Lloyd - driving across the country to return a briefcase of money to its rightful owner. Harry and Lloyd are painfully unaware that a crime syndicate is also after that money, and that their safety is very much in question from the moment they embark.

Unlike other films on this list, Dumb and Dumber doesn’t have much to say about the inherent power of road trips, besides as a plot device. That the film isn’t exactly lyrical about the  forces of travel doesn’t detract from its humor, though, and that is ultimately the point of the entire exercise. What makes the characters of Dumb and Dumber so hilarious is precisely that they don’t change, that they refuse to change, that they don’t even acknowledge change as an option.  They can’t be transformed by the road trip, because their very essence makes that impossible.

The film, despite being pretty blue in its humor, is actually thoughtful in that regard. Where most road trip films zig, Dumb and Dumber zags. If the movie concluded with its idiot protagonists having learned something, it would feel cheap, unearned. Instead, when Harry and Lloyd unthinkingly pass up the opportunity to be oil boys for a busload of models at the film’s end, only to continue walking on foot, it feels hilariously perfect .

3. Thelma and Louise

Thelma and Louise is a road trip film with something to say, something prescient and relevant today that was remarkably ahead of its time in 1991. The film follows two friends , Thelma (Geena Davis) and Louise (Susan Sarandon) who take to the road for a two-day vacation. What begins as a regular retreat ends in disaster, marked by murder, robbery, and suicide.

The film’s attitude toward male oppression - and the appropriate female response - is complicated, and difficult to unpack in this space. The titular characters have both been affected by male violence in one way or another, and their decision to deliver  retribution in kind ultimately leads to their untimely death.

The above description might make an uninitiated reader expect Thelma and Louise to be dark, disturbing, and tragic - and it is that. But remarkably, the film is also vibrant and funny, populated with characters that jump off the screen. Whether it is a truly feminist statement, or an armed and violent perversion of feminist ideology, or anti-male, or none of the above is really is an argument for a different space entirely. We are concerned with Thelma and Louise as a road trip movie, and it succeeds in being a completely unique and rewarding entry in that category.

2. The Blues Brothers

In road trip films, by definition, the travel serves a purpose; it isn’t just a matter of circumstance. T he Blues Brothers might just be the exception that proves the rule in that regard. The trip in question isn’t one of self-discovery, or transformation. The miles logged don’t have inherent power or value. Instead, the road trip in The Blues Brother  gives the film itself shape. As characters move from one place to the next, the film gains momentum and the stakes grow exponentially higher.

Jake and Elwood Blues are a pair of seedy musicians, seeking to save the boys home where they grew up from closure, if only to give themselves some form of redemption. To do so, they must reassemble their old group and play music for money. To a certain extent, that is the gist of the entire film. What actually appears on screen, though, is a demolition opera, complete with car chases, crashes, shootouts, and fantastic musical numbers. The road trip doesn’t contribute to the film’s function, but it certainly defines the film’s form.

1. Easy Rider

This list began with Road Trip , a time capsule distinctly from the year 2000. We will finish it with Easy Rider , the best road movie of all time and a film unmistakably from 1969.

Easy Rider is all about the trip. The film presents two protagonists, latched onto a reality that is quickly disappearing around them. The two are free spirits, counter-cultural travelers at the end of the sixties - a time when ideas of renegade spirit and true freedom were slowly corroding. Wyatt (Peter Fonda) and Billy ( Dennis Hopper ), travel from Los Angeles to New Orleans by motorcycle, hoping to make it in time for Mardi Gras. They are flush with cash from a recent drug deal and open to whatever the road has in store for them.

What they find is unexpected – it seems the country, at least where they are, isn’t as welcoming to free spirited weirdos as it once was. Wyatt and Billy, two bikers who just want a taste of true freedom and the road, stand out in the small towns and rural communities along their trail. They are marked as outsiders, vagrants, and tragedy ultimately befalls them.

It’s a tale that couldn’t possibly have been told in one place. The road trip was vital in unearthing the truth about America, at least the truth that the filmmakers and the protagonists were living. Easy Rider is the quintessential road movie, and the best the category has to offer.

The 27 best road trip movies to watch so you forget you're stuck at home

• Can't go anywhere right now? A good road trip movie could put you in a better mood.
• Here are the 27 all-time best.
• Classics like "Easy Rider" and "Thelma & Louise" are on our roundup.
• There are also more recent movies like "Logan" and "Magic Mike XXL." 
• Visit Insider's homepage for more stories .

Hollywood has always had a soft spot for road trip movies, and some have become memorable not just for what was shown on screen, but what the spirit of the movie meant for the people who saw them.

Take "Easy Rider" for example, whose no-rules approach launched a new way that movies were made for decades. Or "Thelma & Louise," which was as much about female empowerment as it was about a movie about two people on the run from the law.

Here are 27 road trip movies (listed alphabetically) you should check out before heading on your own adventure:

"Almost Famous" (2000)

Cameron Crowe's love letter to the 1970s rock and roll scene, which he covered as a writer for Rolling Stone, is a fun look at adolescence, fame, and highlights the non-stop grind of a band being "on the road."

"The Blues Brothers" (1980)

John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd play two brothers on a mission from God. Trying to get on the straight-and-narrow after getting out of prison, Jake Blues (Belushi) and his brother Elwood (Aykroyd) decide to help raise the money the Catholic home they were raised in needs to stay open. That leads to a road trip around Illinois to get the band back together.

"Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan" (2006)

With the help of director Larry Charles, Sacha Baron Cohen creates one of the funniest road trip movies ever made as he takes his character, Borat, to America to marry Pamela Anderson. But in the process, the movie highlights the US itself, as Borat travels the country doing everything from singing the Kazakhstan national anthem at a rodeo to hanging out with some fraternity kids.

"Dumb and Dumber" (1994)

In this Farrelly brothers classic, friends Lloyd (Jim Carrey) and Harry (Jeff Daniels) are convinced the gas man is out to get them after the death of their bird, so they decide to drive to Aspen to hand-deliver a briefcase the beautiful Mary (Lauren Holly) "forgot" at the airport. Oh, and they are hitting the road in a truck that's made up to look like a dog.

"Easy Rider" (1969)

It's the movie that launched the "New Hollywood" era of the 1970s and was made with little money and lots of drugs.

Directed by Dennis Hopper, the Hollywood bad boy also stars alongside Peter Fonda as two hippie bikers (Jack Nicholson also shows up) who travel from LA to New Orleans after cashing in on smuggling cocaine from Mexico. On their freewheeling trip, they find an America that's split between the stuffy establishment and the younger generation that is starving for change.

"The End of the Tour" (2015)

The days of conversations between Rolling Stone reporter David Lipsky (Jesse Eisenberg) and author David Foster Wallace (Jason Segel) are beautifully profiled in director James Ponsoldt's intimate story that has the two men interacting while on the road for Wallace's book tour.

"Into the Wild" (2007)

Based on a true story, Christopher McCandless' quest to go off the grid and hitchhike to Alaska to live in the wilderness is a powerful exploration of human desire and the kindness of strangers.

"It Happened One Night" (1934)

Frank Capra's famous movie is romantic comedy at its best. Claudette Colbert plays a spoiled heiress running from home, and Clark Gable is a reporter who finally thinks he's found a story that will get him some attention as he follows her to New York. But it will be forever known for its hitchhiking scene in which Colbert's character gets them a ride by pulling up her skirt to show off her legs.

"Little Miss Sunshine" (2006)

Filled with an all-star cast including Steve Carell, Toni Collette, Greg Kinnear, Paul Dano, Alan Arkin, and Abigail Breslin, we follow a dysfunctional family as they jump in a VW bus to drive the young Olive (Breslin) on a cross-country trip to the finals of a beauty pageant she's competing in.

"Logan" (2017)

Marking the coda of the Hugh Jackman era as Wolverine, director James Mangold delivers a somber drama of the superhero's final days. Here he and Charles Xavier set out to drive a young mutant to a refuge in North Dakota. That sounds simple, but it definitely isn't.

"Magic Mike XXL" (2015)

In this fantastic sequel to the 2012 original, Mike (Channing Tatum) sets out on the road with the remaining members of the Kings of Tampa in a food truck to Myrtle Beach for one final performance.

"Midnight Run" (1988)

Robert De Niro is fantastic in this foul-mouthed comedy as bounty hunter Jack Walsh who plans to cash in when he tracks down a sneaky accountant (played by Charles Grodin) who has jumped bail.

But with the FBI, other bounty hunters, and the mob also trying to get their hands on his bounty, things aren't easy for Jack.

"The Motorcycle Diaries" (2004)

Based on the Che Guevara memoir he wrote before becoming the Marxist revolutionary, Gael García Bernal plays young Guevara who, in 1952, went on a trip across South America with his friend Alberto Granado (Rodrigo de la Serna). The experience shaped Guevara's life as it showed him the injustices of the world.

"The Muppet Movie" (1979)

Marking the first time the Muppets appear on the big screen, Kermit, Fozzie Bear and the rest of the gang go on a cross-country drive to Hollywood in hopes of making it big. A load of cameos, songs, and hilarity occur along the way.

"National Lampoon's Vacation" (1983)

This classic from director Harold Ramis stars Chevy Chase as one of his most memorable characters, Clark W. Griswold, the ambitious father whose vacation plans always never work out.

Clark takes the family cross-country to Walley World and in the process leaves chaos in his wake.

"On the Road" (2012)

Based on the iconic Jack Kerouac novel, Sam Riley plays the book's narrator, Sal Paradise, who after meeting Dean (Garrett Hedlund) and Marylou (Kristen Stewart), head on a free-spirited road trip across the country.

"Over the Top" (1987)

Sylvester Stallone plays trucker and arm wrestling pro Lincoln Hawk who needs to get to Las Vegas to compete in the world arm wrestling tournament. But he also has to get his estranged son to his dying mother. This all leads to a big-rig father-and-son road trip.

"Pee-wee's Big Adventure" (1985)

A loose parody of Vittorio De Sica's classic "Bicycle Thieves," Tim Burton makes his own classic around the zany antics of Paul Reubens' hit character Pee-wee Herman.

The movie follows the "boy" as he goes to search of his stolen bike, which he's been told by a psychic is in the basement of the Alamo (spoiler alert: there's no basement in the Alamo).

"Planes, Trains & Automobiles" (1987)

Steve Martin and John Candy play two men who suddenly have to become travel companions as they try to get home for the holidays. Written and directed by John Hughes, Martin and Candy together are a delight.

"Rain Man" (1988)

Tom Cruise plays sleazy Charlie Babbitt and Dustin Hoffman is his brother Raymond, who suffers from savant syndrome. Hoping to cash in on the fortune Raymond got from their father, Charlie sets the two out on a cross-country trip leading to a lot of self-discovery.

If you've never seen Barry Levinson's Oscar-winning movie, now's the time.

"Road Trip" (2000)

Of course "Road Trip" was going to be on this list. Todd Phillips' insane raunchy comedy about four college friends on a race against time to retrieve a sex tape sent in the mail to one of their girlfriends is always a fun watch.

"Smokey and the Bandit" (1977)

Burt Reynolds teams with his pal and longtime stunt double Hal Needham for his first directing effort, and it would go on to become a classic road trip movie.

Reynolds plays a fast-driving bootlegger who has to transport 400 cases of Coors beer safely from Texarkana to Atlanta. But things get complicated when Reynolds picks up a runaway bride (played by Sally Field) along the way.

"The Straight Story" (1999)

In one of David Lynch's most traditional storytelling offerings, Richard Farnsworth plays a man who sets out on a trip via riding a lawnmower to make things right with his ill brother.

The story is based on a real-life event, in which Alvin Straight traveled 240 miles from Iowa to Wisconsin on a lawnmower.

"Stranger Than Paradise" (1984)

Jim Jarmusch's second feature film follows Willie and his friend Eddie as they set out on a road trip to Cleveland to visit Willie's cousin from Hungary, Eva.

The movie went on to be regarded as a landmark work in the independent film world for its unconventional long takes and do-it-yourself aesthetic.

"Thelma & Louise" (1991)

Ridley Scott's look at the road-trip-turned-manhunt adventure of friends Thelma (Geena Davis) and Louise (Susan Sarandon) is arguably more powerful today because of the #MeToo than when it opened in the early 1990s.

"Tommy Boy" (1995)

Perhaps the best Chris Farley/David Spade collaboration, in this one Farley plays an underachieving college graduate who suddenly has to travel the nation (with Spade as the geeky sidekick) to keep the accounts for his auto-parts family business after his father dies. This one truly shows off Farley's high-energy comedy greatness.

"Y Tu Mamá También" (2001)

Director Alfonso Cuarón received a best screenplay Oscar nomination with his brother Carlos for this powerful road trip movie that made Diego Luna and Gael García Bernal international stars.

• Main content

The 100 Best Road Movies Ever!!!

1. O Brother, Where Art Thou?

2. It Happened One Night

3. Easy Rider

4. The Grapes of Wrath

5. Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope

6. Thelma & Louise

7. The Searchers

8. Paper Moon

9. The Wizard of Oz

10. The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert

11. Mad Max

12. La strada

13. Saving Private Ryan

14. Almost Famous

15. Two-Lane Blacktop

16. Y tu mamá también

17. Get on the Bus

18. Wild Boys of the Road

19. The Stolen Children

21. My Own Private Idaho

22. Harry and Tonto

23. Sullivan's Travels

24. Two for the Road

25. No Country for Old Men

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16 Road Trip Movies That Make Us Want To Hit The Road

One type of film that always tends to put a smile on your face by the end is the road trip movie . You get all of your main characters stuck with each other in a car or any other form of transport and you watch how their relationships are forced to grow. The best road trip movies also tend to put you in the mood to go on a road trip of your own. 

They make you want to take a week off of work, pack up the suitcases, fire up a playlist , and hit the road with friends and family. Still, a spontaneous road trip isn't always possible. That's okay! Just watch these films and enjoy the ride with your favorite characters. 

• Metaweb (FB)

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  After his father dies from a heart attack, man-child Tommy Callahan (Chris Farley) tries to save his father’s company. Being joined by his father’s assistant, Richard (David Spade), the two set off on a cross-country trip to find more clients. As with any Chris Farley film, hilarity ensues along the way.

Highlight Of The Trip: Tommy is not the best salesman, and he’ll be the first to tell you. Tommy tries to sell a client brake pads, using toy cars for an all-too-vivid demonstration of what would happen if the wrong brakes were used. Tommy goes so far as to light one of the toy cars on fire directly on the desk, all with the great physical comedy that only Chris Farley could do. 

Fun Fact About The Movie: According to an interview on Rob Lowe's podcast , David Spade and Chris Farley got into a fight on set. This was due to Chris being jealous of David hanging out with Rob Lowe so much. 

• Actors : Chris Farley, David Spade, Brian Dennehy, Bo Derek, Dan Aykroyd
• Released : 1995
• Directed by : Peter Segal
• We're the Millers

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  In order to smuggle a large haul of drugs in Mexio, drug dealer David (Jason Sudeikis) hires a stripper named Rose (Jennifer Aniston) and two local teens to pretend to be his family. Looking like a normal suburban family should hopefully help them get past customs while crossing the border. 

Highlight Of The Journey:  David and Rose try to act like actual parents by meeting the man that’s picking up Casey (Emma Roberts) on a date. Meet Scottie P., a carnival worker with a chest tattoo with the saying “No Ragrets,” a simple credo he lives by. The irony is not lost on anyone. 

Fun Fact About The Movie:  Will Arnett and  Jason Bateman were both considered to play David in the film, before the job went to Jason Sudeikis.  

• Actors : Jennifer Aniston, Jason Sudeikis, Will Poulter, Emma Roberts, Ed Helms
• Released : 2013
• Directed by : Rawson Marshall Thurber

National Lampoon's Vacation

• Warner Bros.

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase) wants to take his family to Walley World. While they could’ve easily flown from Chicago to California, Clark pines for that picture-perfect family road trip instead, cramming everyone into his metallic pea-colored Family Truckster. 

Highlight Of The Trip: Despite having been on the worst road trip imaginable, the Griswolds finally make it to Walley World, only to discover it’s closed for two weeks. Clark, always wanting the best for his family, uses a BB gun to hold a security guard hostage and force him to take everyone on the rides. 

Fun Fact About The Movie: The original ending saw Clark show up at the house of Walley World owner Roy Walley (Eddie Bracken), and holding him hostage for closing the park. Test audiences didn’t like this ending as they felt cheated out of the Walley World payoff. 

Planes, Trains and Automobiles

• Paramount Pictures

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  Neal Page (Steve Martin) is an uptight marketing executive who just wants to get home for Thanksgiving. However, due to bad weather, his plane to Chicago is forced to land in Kansas. Neal has no choice but to travel by car alongside the talkative but kind-hearted Del Griffith (John Candy), whom he met at the airport.

Highlight Of The Journey:  An infuriated Neal tries to rent a car in St. Louis but no longer has his rental agreement. This causes him to go on a legendary tirade to the poor rental agent, dropping the f-bomb for about every other word he says. 

Fun Fact About The Movie:  Writer/director John Hughes based the film on a very similar experience he had when he was an advertising copywriter. He was flying from New York to Chicago, but bad weather forced the plane to land in Kansas, just like in the film. 

• Actors : Steve Martin, John Candy, Laila Robins, Michael McKean, Kevin Bacon
• Released : 1987
• Directed by : John Hughes

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  Zombieland follows four characters who eventually cross paths on their journeys. You've got zombie survivalist expert Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg) trying to find his parents. Wichita (Emma Stone) and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin) are con artist sisters who want to get to the Pacific Playland theme park. Then there's Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), who's just enjoying the open road, killing zombies in the coolest way possible.  

Highlight Of The Trip: In one of the best cameos of all time, the characters find themselves exploring the Hollywood Hills, eventually taking shelter in the house of comedy legend Bill Murray. While Murray pretends to be a zombie to scare Columbus, he's unceremoniously shot in the chest due to Columbus's quick survival instincts. Whoops.

Fun Fact About The Movie: Zombieland was originally sold to CBS as a TV show , but like many scripts, it didn't have a chance of seeing the light of day. Thankfully, producer Gavin Polone loved the script so much that he took it to Columbia Pictures to have it turned into a film.  

• Actors : Woody Harrelson, Jesse Eisenberg, Emma Stone, Abigail Breslin, Amber Heard
• Released : 2009
• Directed by : Ruben Fleischer

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  While trying to mail a tape to his long-distance girlfriend detailing his life in college so far, Josh (Breckin Meyer) accidentally sends a tape of him cheating on her instead. His other friends join him on long road trip to Austin to prevent her from seeing the tape. 

Highlight Of The Journey:  The gang ends up being stopped by a broken bridge on the road, requiring them to have to jump the gap instead. One of the friends Rubin insists that the physics are correct and that they could make it. Against all odds, they do make the jump, though the car itself doesn’t survive the fall.  

Fun Fact About The Movie:  The man who tries to lick Beth’s (Amy Smart) feet on the bus is the film’s writer/director Todd Phillips. Yes, the same Todd Phillips would go on to direct smash-hits such as  The Hangover, Old School , and  Joker .

• Actors : Seann William Scott, Breckin Meyer, DJ Qualls, Fred Ward, Andy Dick
• Released : 2000
• Directed by : Todd Phillips

Dumb and Dumber

• New Line Cinema

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take? Harry (Jeff Bridges) and Lloyd (Jim Carrey) are two dimwitted best friends who drive to Colorado to return a briefcase to Mary (Lauren Holly), a woman Lloyd is hopelessly in love with. Little do they know, the briefcase is filled with ransom money that Mary assembled to free her kidnapped husband, putting them in the crosshairs of some violent criminals. 

Highlight Of The Trip: Joe “Mental” Mentalino, one of kidnappers, is nearly pushed to his limit as he's stuck riding in between Harry and Lloyd in the van. Between Harry and Lloyd playing tag to Lloyd attempting his “ most annoying sound in the world ” scream, Joe is about to ready to pull his gun out on both of them. 

Fun Fact About The Movie: Jim Carrey was originally offered $350,000 for the film, but after Ace Ventura: Pet Detective opened big at the box-office, his salary was renegotiated to $7 million , which was very high at the time for a comedic actor.

• Actors : Jim Carrey, Jeff Daniels, Lauren Holly, Teri Garr, Karen Duffy
• Released : 1994
• Directed by : Peter Farrelly

Almost Famous

• DreamWorks Pictures

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  Young freelance writer William Miller (Patrick Fugit) gets the opportunity of a lifetime from Rolling Stone magazine to write about the new band Stillwater by accompanying them on tour. The tour gives William a first-hand look at the hectic world of rock-n-roll.

Highlight Of The Trip:  William and Stillwater’s lead singer Russell Hammond (Billy Crudup) find themselves at a high school party after Russell gets into a fight with the band. After a few too many substances, Russell stands on the rooftop and delivers the now iconic “I am a golden god” line. 

Fun Fact About The Movie:  The film is semi-autobiographical from writer/director Cameron Crowe, who toured with several bands for Rolling Stone magazine. The movie’s fictional band Stillwater is based around a few bands, such as The Who, The Allman Brothers Band, and the Eagles. 

• Actors : Billy Crudup, Frances McDormand, Kate Hudson, Jason Lee, Patrick Fugit
• Directed by : Cameron Crowe

• Open Road Films

What Kind of Journey Do They Take? After famed chef Carl Casper (Jon Favreau) has a meltdown that goes viral, he decides to start fresh and buy a food truck, taking it from Miami to Los Angeles with his son Percy and friend Martin. Through this trip, Carl hopes to fix his estranged relationship with Percy, while also re-discovering his passion for cooking.

Highlight Of The Trip: At the end of the trip, Percy sends Carl a video where he captured one second of each day from the trip. Carl can't help but smile and cry as he views the joyous memories he just made with his son.

Fun Fact About The Movie: The film was inspired by famous chef Roy Choi , who is known as one of the architects behind the modern food truck movement. Chef Choi was a consultant for the film and ensured that the food shown on-screen was accurately made, including the delicious looking Cubano sandwiches.

• Actors : Jon Favreau, Sofía Vergara, John Leguizamo, Scarlett Johansson, Dustin Hoffman
• Released : 2014
• Directed by : Jon Favreau

Little Miss Sunshine

• Fox Searchlight Pictures

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  Sherry (Toni Collette) and Richard (Greg Kinnear) have two days to drive from New Mexico to California so their spunky daughter Olive (Abigail Breslin) can compete in the “Little Miss Sunshine” beauty pageant. Joining them in their bright yellow Winnebago is their weird son Dwayne (Paul Dano), Sherry's depressed brother Frank (Steve Carell), and Richard's foul-mouthed father Edwin (Alan Arkin).

Highlight Of The Trip: Once Olive gets to do her performance on stage, everyone is caught off-guard by her suggestive dance to Rick James's “Superfreak." Not wanting her to embarrass herself in front of everyone, each family member eventually joins in, much to the disapproval of the judges. It's an incredibly heartfelt scene that shows how close the family has become over the long trip.

Fun Fact About The Movie: Steve Carell was not a huge star when initially cast, with some of the producers wanting to go with someone more well-known at the time. Between the filming of the movie and its release, both The 40-Year-Old Virgin and The Office had come out, causing the producers to heavily market the film around Carell.

• Actors : Greg Kinnear, Steve Carell, Toni Collette, Alan Arkin, Abigail Breslin
• Released : 2006
• Directed by : Jonathan Dayton, Valerie Faris

Thelma & Louise

• Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  Thelma (Geena Davis) and Louise (Susan Sarandon) are two best friends who decide to leave their mundane lives and hit the road together. Unfortunately, a man tries to assault Thelma, leading to Louise killing the man and forcing both women to go on the run from the police. 

Highlight Of The Journey:  In desperate need of money, Thelma ends up robbing a convenience store at gunpoint, though Louise is not aware of this until Thelma comes running out. Louise is none too happy as they drive off. In Thelma’s defense, at least she didn’t kill anybody.  

Fun Fact About The Movie:  This was Brad Pitt’s breakout role. On The Graham Norton Show , Geena Davis told audiences that she was the one who gave the thumbs up to cast Brad Pitt, so you have her to thank. 

• Actors : Susan Sarandon, Geena Davis, Harvey Keitel, Michael Madsen, Christopher McDonald
• Released : 1991
• Directed by : Ridley Scott

• Universal Pictures

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  In the 1960s, Frank “Tony Lip” Vallelonga (Viggo Mortensen) is hired to drive Black classical pianist Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali) across the deep south for a tour. The pair use  The Negro Motorist Green Book , which was a guide to tell Black travelers where all the safest places to visit across the south are.

Highlight Of The Journey:  After leaving a country club that Don was supposed to play at, due to him being refused a table in the dining room, Don and Tony end up at a Black blues club. Don decides to hop on the piano and play classical music. Though hesitant at first, the rest of the bar patrons end up very impressed, with the rest of the blues band later joining Don on stage. 

Fun Fact About The Movie:  The real-life Frank Vallelonga ended up becoming an actor . His most notable role was mob boss Carmine Lupertazzi Sr. in HBO’s  The Sopranos .

• Actors : Viggo Mortensen, Mahershala Ali, Linda Cardellini, Sebastian Maniscalco, Dimiter D. Marinov
• Released : 2018

Pee-wee's Big Adventure

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  Pee-wee Herman (Paul Reubens) adores his red bike. In fact, he won't even sell it for $100 million, billion, trillion dollars. When the bike is stolen, Pee-wee makes it his mission to find his beloved bike, forcing him to hitchhike to Texas, running into a colorful cast of characters on the way. 

Highlight Of The Trip: Pee-wee finds himself inside a biker bar to use the phone. After Pee-wee accidentally knocks over the motorcycles, the bikers are ready to kill Pee-wee. Thankfully, the bar has a jukebox machine, and the busboy conveniently has a pair of dancing shoes. Pee-wee ends up winning all the bikers over with his dance routine to the song “Tequila.” The bikers are so impressed that they embrace Pee-wee as one of their own. 

Fun Fact About The Movie: Paul Reubens was given a 1940s Schwinn bike to ride around the studio. Reubens loved the bike so much he dropped the original plot and rewrote the film to be about Pee-wee searching for his missing bike.

• Actors : Paul Reubens, E.G. Daily, Mark Holton, Diane Salinger, Tony Bill
• Released : 1985
• Directed by : Tim Burton

Are We There Yet?

• uploaded by CarmelMama

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  Though Nick (Ice Cube) isn't the biggest fan of kids, he ends up dating Suzanne (Nia Long), a single mother of two. Nick ends up with the task of having to take both kids to Vancouver. Little does he know that both kids are dedicated to sabotaging any man who tries to date their mom. 

Highlight Of The Journey:  Not even a split-second after Nick tells both kids to be careful opening his door, Kevin (Philip Daniel Bolden) immediately hits the door on a bollard, getting yellow paint on Nick’s brand new Lincoln Navigator. It’s Ice Cube’s great comedic timing that really makes this scene hilarious.   

Fun Fact About The Movie:  This would be Ice Cube’s first PG movie. In an interview with HipHopDX , Cube stated that he was thrilled to do Are We There Yet? as it would introduce him to the kids of all his fans. 

• Actors : Ice Cube, Nia Long, Jay Mohr, M.C. Gainey, Aleisha Allen
• Released : 2005
• Directed by : Brian Levant

The Muppet Movie

• Sony Pictures

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  Kermit the Frog tries to make his way to Hollywood for a life in show-business. On the way, he runs into some new friends like Fozzie Bear and Miss Piggy, all while evading the ruthless Doc Hopper, who just wants Kermit to be his spokesperson for his frog legs business.

Highlight Of The Journey:  The musical number “Movin’ Right Along” sees Kermit and Fozzie Bear driving along the highway. It’s a super-catchy song that contains the amusing bit where Kermit tells Fozzie to avoid the fork in the road, which is an actual giant fork on the road. 

Fun Fact About The Movie:  The final sequence took over 150 puppeteers to film.  In an interview with John Landis , he claims to have been one of those puppeteers, along with future legendary director Tim Burton. 

• Actors : Charles Durning, Austin Pendleton, Steve Martin, Mel Brooks, Edgar Bergen
• Released : 1979
• Directed by : James Frawley

What Kind Of Journey Do They Take?  Depressed author Miles (Paul Giamatti) and soon-to-be married Jack ( Thomas Haden Church ) are two middle-aged men who decide to go on a road trip across California’s wine country. While Miles just wants it to be a relaxing trip, Jack decides he wants to have one little fling with a random girl before he gets married. 

Highlight Of The Journey:  Miles wishes to drown his sorrows in wine after his book is rejected by a publisher, but the server cuts him off since this is a tasting. Insisting on getting all the wine he wants; Miles grabs the bucket that everyone had been spitting in for their tasting and pours it all over himself. 

Fun Fact About The Movie:  In the DVD commentary, Giamatti revealed that after filming the scene where they eat at Miles’s mother’s house, all three actors got food poisoning from the food. 

• Actors : Paul Giamatti, Thomas Haden Church, Virginia Madsen, Sandra Oh, Marylouise Burke
• Released : 2004
• Directed by : Alexander Payne
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Will & harper docu goes on transgender road trip with will ferrell.

Harper Steele and Will Ferrell in Will & Harper.

As the rights and acceptance of the LGBTQ+ community have expanded over the past 50 or so years, one part of that group, transgender people, has found it more difficult to be considered a normal part of society. Every new instance of putting the story of a transgender person on screen, whether fictional or real, increases their exposure to those who might never have encountered them before.

That makes a documentary like Will & Harper (a title which seems to take inspiration from the groundbreaking TV series Will & Grace ) valuable. The fact that the “Will” in the title is comedian/actor Will Ferrell helps, as he and longtime friend, Harper Steele, embark on a road trip across the United States soon after Harper reveals her transition from a man to a woman.

Harper, who met Will while they were both at Saturday Night Live in the late '90s/early 2000s, decided at the relatively older age of 59 that she could no longer pretend to be someone she wasn’t. The idea of the road trip – and of filming it – came about so that the friends could reconnect, learn more about each other given the momentous change, and do a lot of the things that Harper enjoyed doing by herself prior to her transition.

Director Josh Greenbaum and his crew attach a camera to the hood of Harper’s old Jeep Wagoneer to record her and Will's conversations as they traverse many states, starting in New York and heading west. Their connection to SNL means that many of the show’s current and former stars show up in one form or another along the way, including Tina Fey, Seth Meyers, Tim Meadows, Lorne Michaels, Molly Shannon, Kristen Wiig, and Will Forte, among others.

While their love and respect for Harper is obvious, Harper has trepidation over how strangers in middle America will react to her. The presence of Will (and the cameras) gives her perhaps easier acceptance than someone not traveling with a famous person, but there are still more than a few uncomfortable stops, particularly when they get to the South (Texas does not come off well, but surprisingly Oklahoma does).

Those scenes with everyday Americans are interesting (if occasionally a bit contrived), but the heart of the film is the friendship between Will and Harper. Their conversations range from silly to heartfelt, but there is a genuineness to them that can’t be faked. Harper invites Will to ask her any questions he has about her transition, resulting in insightful – and, often, funny – answers. Their friendship was clearly already strong, but it gets palpably stronger during the 17-day journey.

There are a lot of messages one could get from a film like this, but it’s notable for how apolitical it is. Will and Harper have encounters with Eric Holcomb, the Republican governor of Indiana, as well as a few people wearing MAGA hats, but their positions on transgender people goes unremarked upon. The friends gently correct people who mis-gender Harper, but they never express any animosity towards them. It’s a movie about exploration, with education as a side benefit.

While it might be too strong to say that Will & Harper is a world-changing film, it adds another layer to the story of transgender people as a whole. It also shows the unconditional love between two friends, a lesson that is heartening in divided times.

Will & Harper is now playing in select theaters; it will debut on Netflix on September 27.

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Adventure park news, one-of-a-kind adventure park with secret tunnels dives into the colony.

A one-of-a-kind adventure park founded in Branson, Missouri is making its Texas debut: Called Fritz’s Adventure , it'll open in The Colony, at 5651 Nebraska Furniture Mart Dr. inside Grandscape. According to a spokesperson, it’ll open in late 2024.

Fritz’s Adventure is an entertainment venue for kids and adults who love climbing on all kinds of things. It was founded by owner-CEO Matt Engram, who previously worked in the construction trade and used his know-how to build a facility that would be durable, safe, and creative. Grandscape will be only its second location.

He opened the first location in Branson in 2016, debuting over-the-top features like water tower climbing, mazes, underground tunnels, and hidden passageways. There are 19 high-stakes activities , including a ropes course, 48-foot brick climbing wall, zipline, scavenger hunt, and extreme slides.

Their approach is highly imaginative. One activity is called Cement Mixer — a partially buried concrete mixer drum you can crawl down into, and "find the small emergency access to gain entry to Fritz’s underground." Who does not love a hidden chamber.

There’s nothing else like it, says Fritz’s Adventure Director of Marketing Grace Frankowski.

“The intricacies of our attractions – from underground tunnels and aerial cages to scaling a real city building and ziplining inside to outside – Fritz’s Adventure is where you can do things you never have before,” Frankowski says.

The Colony was selected as the second location for the brand due to its growth and proximity to other family attractions, according to Frankowski. It's an area brimming with entertainment concepts, like Andretti’s and Cosm.

“We saw a fantastic opportunity to join a community that appreciates innovation and memorable experiences,” Frankowski says.

The Branson location is 80,000 square feet, while the Grandscape space is projected to be even bigger at 100,000 square feet. It's currently under construction, with tunnels, an airplane, and warped walls already taking shape. There will also be a cafe on site serving sandwiches, pizzas, snacks, and kids meals, plus alcoholic beverages, such as beer and wine.

There’s a waitlist available for when tickets go live on the site.

The company name comes from The Swiss Family Robinson by Johann Wyss, a story about Fritz, the oldest child in the story and a "natural-born explorer.”

“At Fritz's Adventure, we believe everyone is either in search of their next adventure or they need to find their inner Fritz to face fears and conquer challenge,” Frankowski says.