IFC Films and Sundance Selects Pick Up U.S. Rights to Cannes Premiere 'On the Road'

IFC Films and sister distributor Sundance Selects have jointly acquired all U.S. rights to the Walter Salles-directed adaptation of “On the Road” for a fall theatrical release. The long-in-the-works project, adapted from Jack Kerouac’s classic autobiographical novel by Jose Rivera, will have its world premiere in competition at the Cannes Film Festival this month.

Garrett Hedlund, Sam Riley, Kristen Stewart, Kirsten Dunst, Amy Adams, Tom Sturridge, Danny Morgan, Alice Braga, Elisabeth Moss and Viggo Mortensen star in the film, which follows Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty on a road trip across 1950’s America. Nathanael Karmitz, Charles Gillibert, Rebecca Yeldham and Roman Coppola produced the MK2 Production. Executive producer Francis Ford Coppola had been developing the project since 1978.

"This is a major step forward for us, and we plan to work across AMC Networks in putting all our resources together to make this theatrical release into a significant cultural event,” said Sundance Selects/IFC Films president Jonathan Sehring. “We will show the same passion in releasing this film as the team took behind producing it.”

IFC and MK2 previously collaborated on “Summer Hours,” “Certified Copy” and “Paranoid Park.”

Sundance Selects/IFC Films exec Arianna Bocco negotiated the deal with Bart Walker of Cinetic Media on behalf of the filmmakers.