On the Road (2012 film)
On the Road | |
---|---|
Vanguard Films | |
Distributed by | MK2 Diffusion (France)[3] Lionsgate[4] Icon Film Distribution[5] (United Kingdom) PlayArte Filmes (Brazil)[4] IFC Films Sundance Selects[6] (United States) Alliance Films (Canada)[5] |
Release dates | |
Running time | 137 minutes (Cannes) 124 minutes (Toronto)[7][8] |
Countries | France United Kingdom Mexico Brazil United States Canada |
Language | English |
Budget | $25 million |
Box office | $8.8 million[4] |
On The Road (
Plot
In 1947 New York, on the day his father is buried, Sal Paradise is out with his friend Carlo Marx who is, like him, an aspiring writer. They're invited by mutual friend Chad to meet Dean Moriarty, a young car thief from Denver, and Dean's 16-year-old wife Marylou. Sal and Carlo befriend Dean, smoking
After much contemplation, writer's block, and a solemn visit to his father's grave, Sal decides to join his friends in Denver and embarks on the road for the first time. There, Sal meets Camille, an art college student for whom Dean is divorcing Marylou. Carlo starts to question his sexuality, and Carlo and Dean start an affair. Carlo, Sal, Camille, and Dean visit a bar where Dean plays "I've Got the World on a String" on the jukebox, and Camille bonds with Sal. Carlo tells Sal he thinks he might be gay, and he plans to travel to Africa.
Sal leaves aboard a bus and meets Terry. The two travel to California, where Terry works on cotton fields with her family while Sal helps. Sal and Terry have a brief affair before Sal, realizing he isn't made to work in the fields, heads back home.
In December 1948, Dean, Marylou, and Ed Dunkel arrive at Sal's sister's home in North Carolina, having left Ed's wife Galatea with Old Bull Lee in Louisiana. Sal's family feeds the trio, who haven't eaten for 30 hours, and the next day the trio, Sal, and Sal's mother drive back to New York. The guys and Marylou celebrate New Year's Eve at Carlo's place. Later, Dean convinces Sal to partake in a threesome with him and Marylou. Sal starts kissing Marylou, but Dean's presence makes him nervous, so he tells Dean to go to the kitchen. Following this, Dean and Marylou have sex, while Sal listens in the other room.
The next day, they ride off to California and leave Ed at Bull's. When they arrive in San Francisco, Dean drives to Camille's place, leaving Sal and Marylou to rent a room, where the two have sex. The next morning, Marylou leaves to return to her sailor fiancé in Denver, and Sal goes over to visit Dean and Camille, who by now have a child together and are expecting a second. Sal and Dean visit a nightclub, leaving Camille alone to deal with the baby. When they return home, she kicks Dean out.
Sal and Dean travel to Denver in search of Dean's father, but have no luck finding him. They then travel back to New York with a tall, thin salesman from whom Dean tries to get money in exchange for sex. Dean succeeds, which gives him and Sal enough money to get where they need to go.
Eight months later, Dean asks Sal if he would like to drive to Mexico. When they arrive a kid gets high with them and leads them to a whorehouse, where Dean and Sal dance and have sex with some of the prostitutes. They later roam the streets getting stoned and drunk. However, Sal becomes ill and is hospitalized. Dean then leaves Sal behind, returning to San Francisco to fix his relationship with Camille. After recovering, Sal returns to New York.
In 1950, Sal meets Dean in Manhattan, on his way to a Duke Ellington concert. Dean says he travelled across the country by train to see Sal and that he is having another child with Camille. Sal's friends hurry him so they can get on their way, and as Sal turns to leave, Dean asks for a lift to East 14th Street. Sal tells Dean it was good to see him, and leaves him to walk as Sal and his friends depart. When Sal returns home that night, he is able to write his novel about his life on the road with Dean.
Cast
- Garrett Hedlund as Dean Moriarty
- Sam Riley as Sal Paradise
- Kristen Stewart as Marylou
- Alice Braga as Terry
- Amy Adams as Jane
- Tom Sturridge as Carlo Marx
- Elisabeth Moss as Galatea Dunkel
- Danny Morgan as Ed Dunkel
- Kirsten Dunst as Camille Moriarty
- Viggo Mortensen as Old Bull Lee
- Steve Buscemi as Tall Thin Salesman
- Terrence Howard as Walter
- Giselle Itié as Tonia
- Marie-Ginette Guay as Ma Paradise
Development
Previous attempts
A film adaptation of On the Road had been in development hell for decades. In 1957, Jack Kerouac wrote a one-page letter to actor Marlon Brando, suggesting that he play Dean Moriarty while Kerouac would portray Sal Paradise. In the letter, Kerouac envisioned the film to be shot "with the camera on the front seat of the car showing the road (day and night) unwinding into the windshield, as Sal and Dean yak."[12] Brando never responded to the letter, and later on Warner Bros. offered $110,000 for the rights to Kerouac's book but his agent, Sterling Lord, declined it. Lord hoped for $150,000 from Paramount Pictures, which wanted to cast Brando in the film. The deal did not occur and Kerouac was angered that his agent asked for too much money.[12]
Pre-production
Coppola saw
Casting
In 2010, Salles had to convince the cast he had assembled in 2007 to remain committed to the project.[14] This included Sam Riley as the alter ego of author Jack Kerouac, Sal Paradise, Garrett Hedlund as Dean Moriarty (Neal Cassady), who had been linked to the role since September 2007,[16][18] and Kristen Stewart as Marylou.[19] Salles had wanted to cast her after seeing the Sean Penn film Into the Wild but had to film her scenes before October 2010 when she started shooting The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn.[14] Kirsten Dunst was later cast as Camille (Carolyn Cassady).[20] By the first week of August 2010, Viggo Mortensen and Amy Adams had joined the cast, Mortensen for the role of Old Bull Lee (William S. Burroughs) and Adams as the character's wife, Jane (Joan Vollmer).[21] English actor Tom Sturridge was cast as Carlo Marx (Allen Ginsberg), poet and friend to both Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty.[22] Salles reunited with some of the crew members whom he worked with on The Motorcycle Diaries, including producer Rebecca Yeldham, screenwriter José Rivera, director of photography Eric Gautier, production designer Carlos Conti, and composer Gustavo Santaolalla. Before filming began on August 2, 2010, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada,[16][23] the entire cast underwent a three-week "beatnik boot camp," according to Stewart, which involved reading literature pertaining to the Beat Generation[24] and was led by Kerouac biographer Gerald Nicosia. He played an audio interview that was recorded in 1978 with LuAnne Henderson, Neal Cassady's wife, on whom the book's character Marylou is based.[25] To give the cast an idea of the kind of film he envisioned, Salles screened Jean-Luc Godard's Breathless and John Cassavetes' Shadows.[14]
Principal photography
Production companies
MK2, American Zoetrope, Film4, France Télévisions, Canal+, Ciné+,
Soundtrack
- Hard to Love What You Kill - Written and Performed by Jake La Botz
- Don't Explain - Performed by Tom Sturridge
- Salt Peanuts - Performed by Dizzy Gillespie
- I've Got The World On A String - Performed by Ella Fitzgerald
- Yip Roc Heresy - Written and Performed by Slim Gaillard
- A Sailboat In The Moonlight - Performed by Billie Holiday & Her Orchestra and Lester Young
- Ko-Ko - Written and Performed by Charlie Parker
- Death Letter Blues - Written and Performed by Son House
- Mean And Evil Blues - Performed by Dinah Washington
- Sweet Sixteen - Performed by Greg Kramer
Release
On the Road screened on May 23, 2012 at the
Box office
The film had a limited release and grossed $744,296 at United States box office and $8,040,022 internationally with a worldwide total of $8,784,318.[36]
Critical reception
Early reviews of On the Road were mainly mixed, although the performance of Garrett Hedlund was often singled out for praise and Eric Gautier's photography also received favorable notice. The film has a 45% approval rating on the website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 153 reviews and an average score of 5.53/10. The website's critical consensus states: "Beautiful to look at but a bit too respectfully crafted, On the Road doesn't capture the energy and inspiration of Jack Kerouac's novel."[37] Metacritic gives the film a weighted average score of 56 out of 100, based on 32 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews".[38]
In The Hollywood Reporter, veteran reviewer Todd McCarthy praised the film, writing "While the film’s dramatic impact is variable, visually and aurally it is a constant pleasure. Eric Gautier’s cinematography is endlessly resourceful, making great use of superb and diverse locations".[39] McCarthy also spoke highly of Hedlund's performance saying, "Although the story is Sal/Kerouac’s, the star part is Dean, and Hedlund has the allure for it; among the men here, he’s the one you always watch, and the actor effectively catches the character’s impulsive, thrill-seeking, risk-taking, responsibility-avoiding personality."[39]
Entertainment Weekly magazine's Owen Gleiberman wrote, "The best thing in the movie is Garrett Hedlund’s performance as Dean Moriarty, whose hunger for life – avid, erotic, insatiable, destructive – kindles a fire that will light the way to a new era. Hedlund is as hunky as the young Brad Pitt, and like Pitt, he’s a wily, change-up actor".[40] Stewart's performance garnered some mixed reviews, with one critic writing "Stewart as Marylou completes the awkward threesome for a large part of the film and whilst there is little for her to do here she also makes very little out of what she has to work with,"[41] and that she "flatters to deceive, offering some moments of passion...criminally underplaying a character in Marylou who is supposed to burn with energy."[42] However, New York magazine's Kyle Buchanan wrote, "Certainly, there's nothing regrettable about Stewart's performance here: It reestablishes the promising character actress last seen in Into the Wild and held captive as Twilight's leading lady for years,"[43] and Todd McCarthy said, Stewart "is perfect in the role."[39] Peter Travers from Rolling Stone gave her a positive notice, calling her "a live wire. In the front seat of a car with Sal and Dean – all naked – she jerks off both boys with a joy that defines free spirit."[44]
In her review for
Home media
On the Road was released on DVD and Blu-ray on August 6, 2013 by MPI Media Group.[49]
Awards and nominations
- Hollywood Film Awards - Supporting Actress of the Year Award for Amy Adams (won) (also for Trouble with the Curve and The Master)[50]
- 2012 Cannes Film Festival - Palme d'Or (nominated)[51]
- 2012 Sydney Film Festival - Best Direction for Walter Salles (nominated)[52]
Year-end lists
- Top 10 Independent Films of 2012 - National Board of Review[53]
- 8th, Most Unusual Movies of 2012 - Jon Weisman, Variety[54]
- Best Movies of 2012 - Kees van Dijkhuizen, Jr.[55]
- 25th, Best Posters of 2012 - Adam B. Vary, Entertainment Weekly[56]
- Best Movies of 2012 (not ranked) - Total Film[citation needed]
See also
- Heart Beat, a 1980 film chronicling Jack Kerouac writing On the Road, and its effect on his life as well as those of Neal and Carolyn Cassady.
References
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- ^ "On the Road (15)". British Board of Film Classification. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
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- ^ a b Martelle, Scott (June 4, 2005). "On the road again". The Age. Retrieved 2010-11-30.
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- ^ Soloman, Karen (August 17, 2010). "Hollywood comes to Gatineau to film On the Road". CTV News. Retrieved 2010-08-18.
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