On the Road

A tough yet hyper-sensitive love story and trucker thriller, winner of both the Queer Lion and the Horizons Award in Venice.

In addition to its grand storytelling in the North American tradition of restless souls on the road to everywhere and nowhere, David Pablos’ fifth feature has nothing to do with Jack Kerouac’s classic novel of the same name. Instead, it offers a surprisingly heartfelt tale set in a toxically masculine world, following a worldly, hardened truck driver and his encounter with a rebellious young drifter. Along the vast highways of northern Mexico, an unexpected intimacy grows between the two men, while shadows from the past are never far behind.

• Johan Blomqvist