More than half a century has passed since Jack Kerouac's On the Road was published and over 30 years since Francis Ford Coppola bought the rights to the book. Only today, in one of the Cannes Film Festival's most anticipated events, has director Walter Salles's adaptation finally screened for its first audience.
Stars Kristen Stewart, Garrett Hedlund, Kirsten Dunst and Sam Riley (pictured above L-R) joined director Walter Salles and other On the Road principals to discuss the film at a press conference on Wednesday. Shot over 100,000 kilometers and with years of research heading into the project before shooting, the new film based on the Beat Generation bible finally made good on numerous failed adaptation attempts in the past. "My dad bought the rights in 1979 and aspired to make the movie with a handful of filmmakers through the years," said Roman Coppola, a producer on the film, at the press conference. "Then Walter said he'd like to take it on, and he's such a natural fit for this kind of material."
Salles has indeed put in his own time on the road — most notably in 2004 when he directed The Motorcycle Diaries, another overland film based on the famous travelogue by future Cuban revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara. Salles spent five years retracing the route of On the Road before shooting.
"What we're portraying with this film has a correlation with The Motorcycle Diaries," Salles explained today. "It's about the dawn of a new era and a journey from youth to the beginning of adulthood and [young people] trying to find the freedoms that were denied them. And by doing that, they also changed a culture in a country that was very, very conservative."
The film features Riley (ControL) as Sal, who falls under the spell…
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