FS 42: Road Movies @ 10A
Professor Noah Isenberg

This course examines the adaptable and enduring genre of the road movie in a global context, moving freely across different time periods and national settings. In the American scene, we look at such early entries as It Happened One Night (1934). We also sample from Hollywood
of the late 1960s with such iconic works as Bonnie and Clyde (1967) and Easy Rider (1969), and consider some of the more significant recent iterations such as Stranger Than Paradise (1984), Thelma and Louise (1991) and Sideways (2004). In the international arena, we explore among other films Taste of Cherry (1997) from Iran; Paris, Texas (1976) from Germany; Leningrad Cowboys Go America (1989) from Finland; and Road, Movie (2009) from India. Screenings are accompanied by primary and secondary texts that focus on the wide-ranging meanings that the open road has held over time in literature, history, and myth.