To get you started on your next adventure, here’s the World’s most complete listing of memorable movies and documentaries featuring recreational vehicles.
About Schmidt (2002)
Warren Schmidt has led a safe, predictable life working in the insurance industry in Omaha, Nebraska for many years, yet now faces retirement.
At the same time he is forced to take a hard look at his wife, his life and his relationship with his estranged daughter.
An often hilarious series of events follow as Schmidt embarks on an unpredictable RV journey to attend his daughter’s wedding in Denver.
Buy the DVD here.
American Nomads (2011 Documentary)
Well done BBC Documentary focusing on drifters, drop-outs, tramps and RV snowbirds, squatters, hermits, cowboys and Indians in the American Southwest.
Very interesting stories on how and why many became nomadic, and what the lifestyle means; all done without judgment or glorification.
You can buy the book here.
Plus, you can watch it online for free below.
httpv://youtu.be/_QKbIb8wcz0
Basketball Man (2007 Documentary)
The life and legacy of Dr. James Naismith, inventor of the game of basketball and its 13 original rules, is told through the mission of his grandson, Ian, who travels the country in an RV, carrying the original rules in a golden attache case, spreading the cause of sportsmanship.
Stars many famous basketball players as themselves, including Michael Jordan, Carmelo Anthony, Steve Nash and others.
Buy the DVD here.
Beethoven’s 3rd (2000 Video)
The Newton family from the original Beethoven movies are on vacation in Europe.
They plan to join a Newton family reunion, and to make sure one of their family members definitely makes it, they ship him to travel to the reunion with George Newton’s brother Richard.
Guess which family member it is? That’s right, Beethoven the dog!
The giant mutt follows Richard Newton and his family of a nagging wife and two bratty kids as they hit the road to California in a huge, shiny – and expensive RV, equipped with a DVD player.
Following them are two bumbling crooks who have hidden some secret codes on a DVD that they figure no one in the world will buy, but someone does: Richard.
So now they’ve got a DVD holding top secret information and the crooks must get it back…
Buy the DVD here.
The Blues Brothers (1980)
After the release of Jake Blues from prison, he and brother Elwood go to visit “The Penguin”, the last of the nuns who raised them in a boarding school.
They learn the Archdiocese will stop supporting the school and will sell the place to the Education Authority.
The only way to keep the place open is if the $5000 tax on the property is paid within 11 days. The Blues Brothers want to help, and decide to put their blues band back together and raise the the money by staging a big gig.
As they set off on their “mission from God” they seem to make more enemies along the way. Will they manage to come up with the money in time?
Buy the DVD here.
Borat (2006)
Borat Sagdiyev is a TV reporter of a popular show in Kazakhstan as Kazakhstan’s sixth most famous man and a leading journalist.
He is sent from his home to America by his government to make a documentary about American society and culture.
Borat takes a course in New York City to understand American humor. While watching Baywatch on TV, Borat discovers how beautiful their women are in the form of C. J. Parker, who was played by actress Pamela Anderson who hails from Malibu, California.
He decides to go on a cross-country road trip to California in a quest to make her his wife and take her back to his country.
On his journey Borat and his producer encounter a country full of strange and wonderful Americans, real people in real chaotic situations with hysterical consequences.
Buy the DVD here.
Campfire Tales (1997)
A group of teens, stranded in the woods after a car accident, entertain themselves by telling classic horror stories.
What follows is a series of eerie tales that include monsters, psychopaths, and ghosts, and that remind you that things aren’t always what they seem.
Buy the DVD here.
Child of Grace (2014)
9-year-old Katie has spent most of her life traveling the country in an RV with her father.
One day she sees a portrait of herself on a missing child poster and realizes that the man she thinks is her loving father may be her kidnapper.
As Katie contends with this discovery, a small-town sheriff, her grandfather, simultaneously tries to figure out the truth of her disappearance when new evidence surfaces. Based on the novel June Bug by Chris Fabry.
– Not yet released on DVD. Check back soon.
Crowsnest (2012)
This is a ‘found-footage’ movie from Canada about five young friends who go on a trip to a cabin back in 2011, but on the way (while filming it) they head off the beaten track to a place called Crowsnest where they have heard that you can buy beer for half price!
They get the beer but at the same time they receive a warning to head back where they came from or they will die.
But they don’t take the warning too seriously and keep driving in to the forest.
But they seem to be lost, then an RV hits one of them and all hell breaks loose.
There’s something about the people in the RV. Will the friends survive?
Buy the DVD here.
Darius Goes West (2007 Documentary)
Darius Weems, a 15-year-old with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, had never left his hometown of Athens, Georgia.
In the summer of 2005, he and a group of young college students traveled across the country in a wheelchair-accessible RV to test accessibility in the United States.
Their ultimate goal was to reach Los Angeles and convince MTV’s hit show, “Pimp My Ride,” to customize Darius’s wheelchair.
Along the way, they found joy, brotherhood, and the knowledge that life, even when imperfect, is always worth the ride.
Buy the DVD here.
Dead & Breakfast (2004)
Six friends take a road trip to Galveston in an RV for the wedding of their friend, Kelly.
The driver, Johnny, gets lost and they arrive in the small town of Lovelock and his friends Sara, Kate, Melody, Christian, and David, decide to spend the night in the Bed and Breakfast owned by the creepy Mr. Robert Wise.
David has an argument with the chef of the inn, Henri, and when the chef is found dead and Mr. Wise has a heart attack in the middle of the night, the local Sheriff suspects the group of travelers and tells his Deputy, Enus to seize the keys to their RV and stay in Lovelock for the duration of the investigation.
Buy the DVD here.
Dear Mr. President (2006 Documentary)
In the conflict between Israel and Palestine, both sides share one truth: there are no easy answers.
But five teenage girls from the region who met at a peace camp, and a filmmaker who created the camp, feel they can do something to help with this inherited situation…and they are traveling halfway around the world to try.
DEAR MR. PRESIDENT is a feature-length documentary film that chronicles the land journey of these teenage girls as they travel in an RV from the West Coast to the East Coast across the USA.
Their main goals: to further break down barriers between their enemy cultures and to meet with President George W. Bush.
Visit this website to email for your copy.
The Devil’s Ground (2009)
While traveling from California to Bangor through a lonely road, Carrie Mitchel is advised by the gas station attendant Jimmy to rest in a hotel; however, she decides to continue driving through the night.
Later she almost hits the teenager Amy Singer who is wandering on the road wounded with blood on her face.
She gives a lift to Amy that tells that her friends from the Boston University Mike, Greg, Tammy and Lisa and she had traveled in a RV to Arrowhead to research the area as part of a discipline in their course.
When they stopped in a gas station, the attendant Billy advised them to avoid the place in Bradford City called “Devil’s Playground” by the locals.
While digging in an area where a mine collapsed on 19 December, 1967 killing 239 coal miners, they find preserved bones that they believe belonged to the Indians.
However, when they find teeth with gold fillings and a watch on the wrist of an arm, they realize that the deaths have recently occurred and they are in a dangerous location.
Buy the DVD here.
Dusk (2014)
John Whitmore wakes one morning to find himself in the midst of a real-life nightmare.
His wife, Anne, disappeared from their bed during the night and a recorded ransom message now remains in her place.
This mysterious recording instructs Whitmore to contact a man named David, who will escort John and his life savings to a cabin deep within the woods, where he will be reunited with his wife.
He does as directed, but not before calling a life-long friend for help. David forces the men into a rusted RV and the three hit the road.
John attempts to calm himself by piecing together the events of the previous evening, but instead he finds himself questioning David’s motivation and, eventually, the entire situation.
It becomes obvious he will need to take a stand to save his wife…and, quite possibly, himself. Told through fragments of the past that shatter the present, “Dusk” explores the darkest recesses of the mind through a night of chaos, deceit and paranoia.
– Not yet released on DVD. Check back soon.
Escape to Witch Mountain (1975)
Tia and Tony are two orphaned youngsters with extraordinary powers.
Lucas Deranian poses as their uncle in order to get the kids into the clutches of Deranian’s megalomanical boss, evil millionaire Aristotle Bolt, who wants to exploit them.
Jason, a cynical widower, helps Tia and Tony “escape to witch mountain,” while at the same time Tia and Tony help Jason escape the pain of the loss of his wife.
Buy the DVD here.
A Finished Life: The Goodbye & No Regrets Tour (2008 Documentary)
A Finished Life: The Goodbye & No Regrets Tour is a feature length documentary about Gregg Gour, a 48-year-old gay man with AIDS, who, when given six months to live, takes the road trip of his life.
Gregg had been HIV positive for 24 years and during that time the side effects of the medications made him increasingly sicker than the virus itself.
In the last several years he felt that his quality of life had diminished considerably, so he chose to go off his meds and no longer fight death.
After giving away all of his belongings, Gregg buys an RV and travels across the United States with his dog, Cody, saying goodbye to family and friends who have to come to terms with Gregg’s decision: That rather than suffer a long, painful death, he will end his own life before allowing the progressing illness to take away his independence.
Buy the DVD here.
From Dusk Till Dawn (1996)
After a bank heist in Abilene with several casualties, the bank robber Seth Gecko and his psychopath and rapist brother Richard Gecko continue their crime spree in a convenience store in the middle of the desert while heading to Mexico with a hostage.
They decide to stop for a while in a low-budget motel.
Meanwhile the former minister Jacob Fuller is traveling on vacation with his son Scott and his daughter Kate in a RV.
Jacob lost his faith after the death of his beloved wife in a car accident and quit his position of pastor of his community and stops for the night in the same motel Seth and Richard are lodged.
When Seth sees the recreational vehicle, he abducts Jacob and his family to help his brother and him to cross the Mexico border, promising to release them on the next morning.
They head to the truck drivers and bikers bar Titty Twister where Seth will meet with his partner Carlos in the dawn.
When they are watching the dancer Santanico Pandemonium, Seth and Richard fight with three bodyguards.
But soon they discover that the bar is a coven of vampires and they need to fight until dawn to leave the place alive.
Buy the DVD here.
Grandma’s Blessings (2013)
A local T.V. talk show host, Drayton Taylor, who dreams of making it big and finally lands an interview of a lifetime that is sure to gain him national exposure.
The combination of his nervousness and some well-meaning co-workers who offer him sedatives (among other things) to calm his nerves get the best of Drayton and this proves disastrous.
Needless to say, the interview goes horribly wrong causing Drayton to lose his job and consequently all his possessions as news of the interview hits the airwaves. To make matters worse, Drayton receives a phone call from an Attorney that his Grandma Sadie, who lived in Austin, Texas, has passed away and left him a special gift.
Drayton flies off to pay his final respects and to claim his inheritance.
Upon arriving at what used to be Grandma Sadie’s home, he discovers an old abandoned Champion RV just sitting there, practically rooted to the ground. Joshua Wright, a trusted friend of Grandma Sadie, helps Joshua to get the RV running again, but just barely.
During his journey back home to Georgia, the RV breaks down several times, driving Drayton to meet some oddly remarkable characters.
Buy the DVD here.
Hollywood to Dollywood (2011 Documentary)
Gay twins Gary and Larry have always loved Dolly Parton.
They left their small town home ten years ago to make it in Hollywood and are finally ready to get their script to Dolly.
In a RV named Jolene, the boys embark on the adventure of a lifetime.
This road trip is also a journey of self-discovery and an attempt to resolve mommy issues that have divided them since childhood.
Featuring 15 of Dolly’s classic songs and Chad Allen, Dustin Lance Black, Beth Grant, and Leslie Jordan.
Buy the DVD here.
The Houses October Built (2014)
Beneath the fake blood and cheap masks of countless haunted house attractions across the country, there are whispers of truly terrifying alternatives.
Looking to find an authentic, blood-curdling good fright for Halloween, five friends set off on a road trip in an RV to track down these underground Haunts.
Just when their search seems to reach a dead end, strange and disturbing things start happening and it becomes clear that the Haunt has come to them…
Watch on Amazon Instant Video here.
How’s Your News? (1999 Documentary)
A Documentary chronicling the travels of a team of reporters and crew across America in a hand painted RV.
Each of the reporters have a disability ranging from Down’s Syndrome to spastic cerebal palsy and their own style for gathering news.
The basic approach is “man on the street” reporting and the interactions are sometimes hysterical, sometimes confusing but always honest.
Buy the DVD here.
The Incredibles (2004)
Bob Parr (A.K.A. Mr. Incredible), and his wife Helen (A.K.A. Elastigirl), are the world’s greatest famous crime-fighting superheroes in Metroville.
Always saving lives and battling evil on a daily basis.
But fifteen years later, they have been forced to adopt civilian identities and retreat to the suburbs where they have no choice but to retire of being a superhero and force to live a “normal life” with their three children Violet, Dash and Jack-Jack (who were secretly born with superpowers).
Itching to get back into action, Bob gets his chance when a mysterious communication summons him to a remote island for a top secret assignment.
He soon discovers that it will take a super family effort to rescue the world from total destruction.
Buy the DVD here.
Independence Day (1996)
On July 2nd, communications systems worldwide are sent into chaos by a strange atmospheric interference.
It is soon learned by the military that a number of enormous objects are on a collision course with Earth.
At first thought to be meteors, they are later revealed to be gigantic spacecraft, piloted by a mysterious alien species.
After attempts to communicate with the aliens go nowhere, David Levinson, an ex-scientist turned cable technician, discovers that the aliens are going to attack major points around the globe in less than a day.
On July 3rd, the aliens all but obliterate New York, Los Angeles, and Washington, as well as Paris, London, Houston and Moscow.
The survivors set out in convoys towards Area 51, a strange government testing ground where it is rumored the military has a captured alien spacecraft of their own.
The survivors devise a plan to fight back against the enslaving aliens, and July 4th becomes the day humanity will fight for its freedom.
Buy the DVD here.
Jack Be Nimble (2008 Documentary)
Jack be Nimble is a film about a group of young men traveling across the country in a beat up RV in order to compete in a series of stunt inline skating competitions.
They belong to a small subculture of athletes that has been banished from the now mainstream world of extreme sports.
Along the way they try to establish their community as a ‘real’ sport deserving of respect from mainstream culture, while at the same time discovering that the activity which once represented rebellion, innocence and individuality has brought them to a crossroads between growing up and following their passion.
Buy the DVD here.
Judgement Night (1993)
Four pals are on their way to a boxing match, but gets stuck in heavy traffic.
To get to the boxing match in time they take the first exit they find to find another way to the venue.
As they are driving around lost in gang-land they get stuck and witness a brutal murder.
The killer wants no witnesses and tries to kill them too.
The four pals get away the first time, but the killer is soon back on their tail again while they are trying to find help in the middle of nowhere.
Buy the DVD here.
Lake Dead (2007)
The Lake sisters – Brielle, Kelly and their step-sister Samantha – receive a surprising inheritance from their unknown grandfather that has just died.
Brielle and Kelly join a group of friends and travel in a RV to visit the Lake Motel and decide what to do with the property.
Soon they find that their unknown relatives are deranged psychos.
Buy the DVD here.
Lost in America (1985)
David and Linda Howard are successful yuppies from LA.
When he gets a job disappointment, David convinces Linda that they should quit their jobs, liquidate their assets, and emulate the movie Easy Rider, spending the rest of their lives traveling around America…in a Winnebago!
(This is a kind of large, luxurious mobile home which suits a 1980’s yuppie more than the counterculture dropout approach of Easy Rider.)
His idealized, unrealistic plans soon begin to go spectacularly wrong.
Buy the DVD here.
Meet the Fockers (2004)
Having given permission to male nurse Greg Focker to marry his daughter, ex-CIA man Jack Byrnes and his wife travel to Miami to Greg’s parents, who this time around are Mr. and Mrs. Focker, who are as different from them as can be.
As asked in the first movie, what sort of people name their son Gaylord M. Focker?
Buy the DVD here.
Meet the Parents (2000)
A Jewish male nurse plans to ask his live-in girl friend to marry him.
However, he learns that her strict father expects to be asked for his daughter’s hand before she can accept.
Thus begins the visit from Hell as the two travel to meet Mom and Dad, who turns out to be former CIA with a lie detector in the basement.
Coincidentally, a sister also has announced her wedding to a young doctor.
Of course everything that can go wrong, does, including the disappearance of Dad’s beloved Himalayan cat, Jinxie.
Buy the DVD here.
National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (1989)
It’s Christmas time and the Griswolds are preparing for a family seasonal celebration, but things never run smoothly for Clark, his wife Ellen and their two kids.
Clark’s continual bad luck is worsened by his obnoxious family guests, but he manages to keep going knowing that his Christmas bonus is due soon.
Buy the DVD here.
Our Time (2009 Documentary)
America has questions about today’s youth, what we care about, and where we’re headed.
We had those questions too.
So, after graduating college, four of us loaded an RV and embarked on a journey looking for answers.
We traveled to all of the lower 48 states, talking to our peers about growing up, 9/11, race, the Internet, careers, sex, love, and the American Dream.
Along the way, we met a wide cross-section of young Americans, ranging from a cancer researcher in Boston to a drug dealer in New Mexico, from an Iraq veteran in Florida to the founder of Facebook in Silicon Valley.
The film ultimately leads to the recent historic election, where our generation finally stands up to make its voice heard.
OUR TIME is a passionate portrayal of a generation, a meditation on coming of age in 21st-century America, and a rallying cry against apathy.
Buy the DVD here.
Paul (2011)
Two sci-fi geeks take a pilgrimage to America’s UFO heartland.
While there, they accidentally meet an alien who brings them on an insane road trip that alters their universe forever.
For the past 60 years, an alien named Paul (voiced by Seth Rogen) has been hanging out at a top-secret military base.
When he discovers he’s been taken prisoner, the space-traveling smart ass decides to escape the compound and hop on the first vehicle out of town – a rented RV containing Earthlings Graeme Willy (Simon Pegg) and Clive Gollings (Nick Frost).
Chased by federal agents and the fanatical father of a young woman that they accidentally kidnap, Graeme and Clive hatch a fumbling escape plan to return Paul to his mother ship.
And as two nerds struggle to help, one little green man might just take his fellow outcasts from misfits to intergalactic heroes.
Buy the DVD here.
Race with the Devil (1975)
Frank and Roger and their wives take off for Colorado in a recreational vehicle, looking forward to some skiing and dirt biking.
While camping en route, they witness a Satanic ritual sacrifice, but the local sheriff finds no evidence to support their claims and urges them to continue on their vacation.
On the way, however, they find themselves repeatedly attacked by cult members, and they take measures to defend themselves.
Buy the DVD here.
Refuge (2010)
The shimmering New Mexico sun bleaches the earth and reflects off towering thunderheads.
From inside an RV nestled among the desert brush just off a barely-paved road, the middle-of-nowhere silence is broken by one quick and alarming gunshot.
Nothing moves.
Moments later, out of the waves of a heat mirage emerges a leather clad Darryl Tripp, high school English teacher, astride a screaming motorcycle.
His mission is to toss his just completed first novel to the four winds, an act of self-loathing and despair.
Buy the DVD here.
RV (2006)
Bob Munro is the dad of a dysfunctional family. He hires an RV to take the family on vacation.
However Bob is NOT the best RV steering wheel operator in the neighborhood and the hilarity is added on by the fact that the brakes are about as useful as a chocolate fireguard.
Bob first realizes it when the RV rolls (not literally) backwards into a line of shopping carts. Also Bob’s job is in danger if he doesn’t go to a very important meeting.
Before you can say “COME BACK! COME BACK!,” things go gloriously, hilariously, Munro-annoyingly wrong due to the lack of brakes, Bob’s job, toilet waste not cleared out from the last rental and more hilarious stuff.
Buy the DVD here.
Spaceballs (1987)
King Roland of the planet Druidia is trying to marry his daughter Princess Vespa to Prince Valium, but Vespa is kidnapped by the evil race of the Spaceballs.
The Spaceballs ask Roland a tremendous ransom: all the air of Druidia (you see, the air of Spaceball had serious pollution problems…).
The King decides to offer a generous amount of money to a space rogue, Lone Starr, to persuade him to save Vespa. What follows is the parody of a LOT of famous SF movies.
Buy the DVD here.
Stripes (1981)
Thanks to a run of bad luck and go-nowhere jobs, John convinces Russell to join the army so they can get in shape, likening it to a health spa.
Once in boot camp, wiseguy John tangles with his by-the-book Sgt. and becomes the unofficial leader for his platoon, made up mostly of other misfits and assorted losers.
After somehow making it through graduation, they are given a special assignment but, thanks to John’s romantic interest in a pretty MPO, the other men wind up behind the Iron Curtain until John, Russell, their dates and Sgt. Hulka make a daring rescue attempt in explosive style.
Buy the DVD here.
The Long, Long Trailer (1953)
Besides making television history as the producers and stars of television’s immensely popular I Love Lucy and The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour, Lucille Ball and her husband, Desi Arnaz, starred in three quite agreeable feature films.
The second of these, 1954’s The Long, Long Trailer, in gorgeous Technicolor and directed by Vincente Minnelli, is a somewhat allegorical tale of a newly married couple who invest in a 40-foot trailer as their first home–and immediately regret it.
Well, at least Arnaz’s character does; he’s the one who has anxiety attacks over operating electric brakes while steering up and down one-lane, mountain roads.
Sight gags are plentiful: a scene in which Ball tries to make beef stew, a Caesar salad, and cake in a wobbling, moving trailer is classic Lucy.
But there are some genuine dramatic sequences in this handsome movie, too, and the stars rise to the occasion.
Buy the DVD here.
We’re the Millers (2013)
David, a drug dealer, is unable to pay his boss what he owes him. So his boss offers him a proposition; go to Mexico and get some marijuana for him.
Knowing it’s going to be difficult to get it across the border, he comes up with a plan; to pose as a family man.
Now all he needs is a family so he asks Kenny, his neighbor, to be his son. He then asks Rose, a stripper he knows to be his wife.
And Kenny suggests they ask Casey, a teen living on her own, to be the daughter.
They call themselves the Millers and rent an RV then go into Mexico and learn that the amount of drugs is way more than David’s boss hinted it would be.
So they put it in the RV and make their way back to the U.S.
But it turns out that David’s boss is trying to pull a fast one. The drugs belong to someone else and he sets out to get them back.
Buy the DVD here.
The Wild Thornberrys (1998 TV Series)
Eliza Thornberry is not your ordinary kid.
It’s not just because she travels the world in an RV with her parents Nigel and Marrianne, famous nature show hosts. Eliza is doubly unique because she was granted the magical ability to talk with and understand animals.
Together with her teen-age sister Debbie, her pet monkey Darwin, and her wild-boy foster brother Donnie, Eliza gets involved with many different wildlife (and wild adventures).
Buy the DVDs here.
Winnebago Man (2009)
Jack Rebney is the most famous man you’ve never heard of – after cursing his way through a Winnebago sales video, Rebney’s outrageously funny outtakes became an underground sensation and made him an internet superstar.
Filmmaker Ben Steinbauer journeys to the top of a mountain to find the recluse who unwittingly became the “Winnebago Man.”
See more here.
Buy the DVD here.
World War Z (2013)
In Philadelphia, the former UN Investigator Gerry Lane, his wife Karin and their two daughters, Rachel and Constance, are trapped in the traffic jam.
Out of the blue, they witness several car crashes caused by the attack of hordes of zombies.
Gerry runs with his family and he steals and drives a RV, heading to Newark, New Jersey.
Gerry calls his old friend, UN Secretary General Thierry Umutoni, who promises to send a helicopter on the next morning to rescue Gerry and his family.
Gerry stops at a supermarket to get supplies and medicine for his asthmatic daughter and the RV is stolen.
They flee to an apartment building and a Latin family helps them, lodging the family in their apartment.
On the next morning, Gerry invites the family to go with them to the roof, but they prefer to stay in their apartment.
However they are attacked by zombies and the boy Tommy joins Gerry and his family in their runaway.
Buy the DVD here.
2012 (2009)
Dr. Adrian Helmsley, part of a worldwide geophysical team investigating the effect on the earth of radiation from unprecedented solar storms, learns that the earth’s core is heating up.
He warns U.S. President Thomas Wilson that the crust of the earth is becoming unstable and that without proper preparations for saving a fraction of the world’s population, the entire race is doomed.
Meanwhile, writer Jackson Curtis stumbles on the same information.
While the world’s leaders race to build “arks” to escape the impending cataclysm, Curtis struggles to find a way to save his family.
Meanwhile, volcanic eruptions and earthquakes of unprecedented strength wreak havoc around the world.
Buy the DVD here.
Source: IMDB
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You forgot “Pink Flamingos” !!