5 of the Best Road Trip Movies to Inspire Your Next Trip

A road trip is an excellent way to engage that free spirit of yours, and experience a different kind of adventure. It gives you a whole new level of freedom and the opportunity to explore the country. And when preparing for one, either its road trip with your small family or one with a couple of friends, make sure you don’t park a pin if you’ve not selected the best road trip movies to keep you and your gang entertained on the road.

Road trip movies have become an important part of the movie industry and an essential ingredient to spice things up in your little adventure and earn you and your gang some laughs.

The best road trip movies to get you excited and have you parking up in a jiffy combines the freedom that comes with the open and powerful characters who are either trying to escape from an unpleasant past or racing to embrace a totally different future. And of course, with some dramas and screw-ups in between.

The most classic road trip movies to get you set for your own road trip should have actual characters in a real-life setting, travelling in an actual vehicle with some exciting road trip ideas. And we’ve put together a shortlist of all-time best road trip movies to get you started;

5 of the best road trip movies

1. Little Miss Sunshine

A classic movie featuring little Olive Hoover (played by Abigail Breslin), a seven-year old who has just earned a spot in the Little Miss Sunshine pageant. To see her perform the hilarious dance her grandfather taught her in the State pageantry and achieve her dream of claiming the price, her supportive but unusual family packs up for a long ride from their home in New Mexico to Redondo Beach, California.

The weird Hoover family – Olive’s parents (Richard and Sheryl), her gay uncle, a heroine-addicted grandfather, and her brother Dwayne – embarks on a road trip in their dilapidated Volkswagen Type 2 bus, which throws in a healthy dose of humor. With a vehicle that is falling apart and a family that can’t seem to keep it together either, will little Miss Hoover make it in time to the State pageantry? You sure do want to find out.

Little Miss Sunshine movie trailer

2. National Lampoon’s Vacation

This beautiful motion picture tells the story of a hilarious family road trip. For the perfect family vacation trip to the amusement park Walley World, the Griswold family set out on a cross-country trip from the Chicago suburbs to the southern Californian Walley World. In a bid to spend more time with his family, Clark Griswold desperately accepts an ugly Wagon Queen Family Truckster. 

But that’s only the beginning of not one, not two, but countless mishaps that mar the family trip and also adds series of twists and humorous scenes that’ll leave you roaring with laughter while probably giving you a few tips about road trips. But you also want to find out if the Griswold family made it to southern California in one piece. This your classic American family movie and if you haven’t seen it, then you should do so ASAP.

National Lampoon’s Vacation movie trailer

3. Planes, Trains & Automobiles

This really isn’t your typical road trip movie, but it’s just as fun. Planes, Trains and Automobile features Neal Page (played by Steve Martins), a businessman in New York traveling home to Chicago for Thanksgiving. He gets on a plane – where he meets an unusual partner – to O’Hare which is diverted to Wichita due to a blizzard in Chicago. 

Neal and his new partner Del, a salesman (played by John Candy) unite in a hotel in Wichita. They take a train to Chicago but only make it to Missouri. These two men battle one problem after the other in their quest to get to their families for Thanksgiving. Packed full with both emotionally-charged and hilarious scenes, this movie takes you through an unusual but exciting journey and gradually winds down to a brilliant final fifteen minutes. 

Planes, Trains & Automobiles movie trailer

4. We are the Millers

Prepare for a completely thrilling experience with this classic road trip movie. We’re the Millers is an entertaining motion picture centred around a family created by the coming together of strangers. A cannabis dealer named David Clark is forced by a drug Lord he owns money to smuggle marijuana to Mexico. 

But David realizing how suspicious it would be for just one man to cross the border, he hires his stripper neighbour Rose, an 18-year old Kenny and a teenage petty thief Casie to pose as bogus family members. This new family called themselves ‘the Millers’ and together, they started on a road trip to transport Marijuana to Mexico but not without running into series of unforeseen happenings which threaten to blow their cover. This classic American comedy film will keep you guessing until the very end and probably teach you a thing or two about road trips.

We are the Millers movie trailer

5. Sideways

This American dramatic comedy will have you roaring back with laughter. It’s a thrilling road trip movie where a depressed writer and school teacher Miles Raymond (played by Paul Giamatti) takes his soon-to-be-married actor friend and former college roommate Jack Cole (played by Thomas Haden Church) through Santa Ynez Valley. While Miles is a wine aficionado looking to drown himself in barrels of merlot, Jack is more interested in having one last fling before his big day. 

As the drama unfolds, these two hilarious men will continue to amuse you with series of ridiculous and almost foolish acts, and Jack even broke his nose and lost a pair of irreplaceable wedding rings. Believe me, you’d like to see this, so grab a glass of wine, sit back and have some good laughs. But don’t forget to invite a couple of friends.

Sideways movie trailer