--- title: "On the Road" year: 2026 kind: "film" canonical: "https://film.one/film/on-the-road" fi1m_id: "on-the-road" imdb_id: "tt37660509" tmdb_id: 1517123 wikidata_id: "Q135686753" fi1m_score: 80 critics_reviews: 3 published: "2026-09-22T05:10:29.565293+00:00" updated: "2026-09-22T05:10:30.242339+00:00" region: "SE" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # On the Road (2026) Directed by David Pablos · 1h 33m · Drama, Thriller, Crime ## Identity On the Road - **Canonical:** https://film.one/film/on-the-road - **Type:** Film - **Fi1m ID:** on-the-road - **IMDb ID:** tt37660509 - **TMDB ID:** 1517123 - **Wikidata ID:** Q135686753 - **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/title/tt37660509/, https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/1517123, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q135686753 **Fi1m score: 80** · Critics: 3 of 6 reviews so far *In a sentence:* Two men, one truck cab, and every mile of Mexican highway wanting to hurt them > David Pablos puts a gay love story into the cab of a long-haul truck and lets the highway close in around it. Frank about sex and quick with violence, tender when it counts, and only in its last stretch does it drive where thrillers usually go. ## Synopsis On the highways of Mexico, Veneno (Victor Prieto Simental) is a young man who sells sex to drivers at the truck stops, moving from one to the next with whatever he can carry. El Muñeco (Osvaldo Sánchez) is a long-haul trucker, older, heavy and quiet, who picks him up as a customer and does not put him down again. Veneno wants a cab to sleep in and a road that leads somewhere other than the last stop; El Muñeco wants nothing he is prepared to say aloud. Around them are the other men who work these routes, among them El Eulas (Mariano López Sosa) and El Pelón (Héctor Cárdenas), and the women at the roadside, Lupe (Obdulia Morales) and Licha (Elizabeth Infante). The first act is diesel, motels, cash counted in a cab, and two men learning whether the other can be trusted. ## Review The title is a translation of *En el camino* and it has nothing to do with Kerouac. David Pablos’s film is about Veneno (Victor Prieto Simental), a young man who sells sex to drivers at the truck stops along Mexico’s highways, and El Muñeco (Osvaldo Sánchez), a trucker who takes him into his cab and then does not want him to leave it. It is a romance first and a thriller second, and Pablos, who also wrote it, has the nerve to make both halves dangerous. We liked it a good deal, with one reservation about where it ends up. The two leads are doing the film’s real work. Simental plays Veneno quick and watchful, a boy who has learned to price a man in the time it takes him to open a door, and who has never once been allowed to be tired. Sánchez plays El Muñeco with almost no dialogue for long stretches; he talks to the engine more readily than to people, and when he does look at Veneno it is with the wariness of a man who knows what wanting something costs out here. The sex scenes are frank and there are several. What we noticed is that they are also the only scenes in which either man stops checking the mirrors. Ximena Amann shoots the road as flat white heat by day and as headlights on nothing by night, and she keeps the camera inside the cab far more than outside it. Belén Estrada’s production design turns that cab into a bedsit: a curtain across the bunk, a small saint on the dash, photographs curling in the heat. Andrea Balency-Béarn’s score is low electronic drone laid under the diesel, so that for whole minutes we could not say where the music ended and the engine began, which is the right effect for a film about two people who live inside a machine. The editors, Jonathan Pellicer and Paulina del Paso, cut long on the road and short at the stops, and the rhythm tells you where the danger is before anyone on screen does. One scene frightened us more than any of the film’s violence. The two men are washing in a truck-stop shower block, the door open, and other drivers walk past without slowing. Pablos holds on the doorway. Nothing happens. It is the not happening that did it: by then the film has taught us what these men are to the men around them, and a held shot of an open door is enough. That is a horror technique used in a romance, and it works. The reservation is the second half, which tightens into a thriller we will not describe. The mechanics are familiar, and the men who drive them, El Eulas (Mariano López Sosa) and El Pelón (Héctor Cárdenas), are closer to types than to people; they are frightening because of what they represent rather than what they say. Pablos also cuts back to Veneno as a boy (Neydan Ricardo) with his father (Francisco Navar Carrera), and these scenes explain what Simental’s face has already told us. The women, Lupe (Obdulia Morales) and Licha (Elizabeth Infante), get a scene or two each and are gone; Morales in particular suggests a whole life in one exchange at a counter and we wanted more of it. Pablos’s earlier films *Las elegidas* and *El baile de los 41* were also about bodies bought, sold and policed. This is looser and faster than either, and the better for it. Diego Luna is among the producers, and the film has something of the roadside Mexico of the pictures he made his name in, minus any of the comfort. At 93 minutes it is over before it can repeat itself. It is not for children, and the sex and the violence arrive with equal bluntness. Watch it with the sound up; the engine is half the score, and the silences in the cab are the other half. *Fi1m score 80, published 22 September 2026.* ## Straight answers **Is On the Road worth watching?** *On the Road* is worth watching for anyone who wants a gay love story told with the nerve of a thriller, and we scored it 80. Victor Prieto Simental and Osvaldo Sánchez carry it almost without dialogue, and at 93 minutes it is over before it repeats itself. Our reservation is the second half, which turns into a more familiar thriller than the first half deserves. **How long is On the Road, and what is it rated?** *On the Road* runs 1h 33m. It is a drama and thriller film. **Where can I watch On the Road in Sweden?** *On the Road* is not on any streaming or rental service in Sweden at the moment. It is available in 9 other countries; change your country at the top of the page to see where. Availability is checked daily. **How violent or frightening is On the Road, and is it suitable for children?** *On the Road* has no certificate in the UK or the US, and it is not for children. The sex scenes are frank and there are several, and the violence arrives with the same bluntness. The most frightening moment involves no violence at all, only a held shot of an open shower-block door, so the squeamish should expect dread as much as blood. **How does On the Road compare to Y Tu Mamá También?** *On the Road* is the darker and more dangerous of the two, while [*Y Tu Mamá También*](https://film.one/film/y-tu-mama-tambien) is the funnier and more humane. Both put men and sex in a vehicle on the Mexican highway, but Cuarón's film has room for jokes and social comment, and Pablos's has none. Choose Cuarón for warmth and Pablos for menace; the earlier film is the more generous, the later the tenser. **What should I watch after On the Road?** After *On the Road*, try [*Y tu mamá también*](https://film.one/film/y-tu-mama-tambien) (2001, Fi1m 87): Two boys, a car and the Mexican road, shot with the same appetite and less menace. Then [*God's Own Country*](https://film.one/film/gods-own-country) (2017, Fi1m 84): Love between working men in a hard place, told with dirt under its nails; and [*The Wages of Fear*](https://film.one/film/the-wages-of-fear) (1953, Fi1m 90): Men, trucks, a murderous road, and tension measured in the length of a held shot. ### Reviews we read (3) - **The Hollywood Reporter**, Jordan Mintzer (88/100, inferred): The critic calls it a knockout filled with sex, violence and heart, describing a tough yet tender gay romance between a young sex worker and a truck driver on Mexico's dangerous highways. The explicit imagery and violence serve to underscore an emotional story of connection amid exploitation and peril. [Read](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-reviews/on-the-road-review-mexican-gay-romance-diego-luna-1236362360/) - **Variety**, Guy Lodge (84/100, inferred): The critic praises this heady, sensual queer thriller from Mexican director David Pablos as a dynamic genre piece with its own roaming spirit, distinct from any Kerouac adaptation. It is noted for its taut emotional territory, frank sex scenes, and blend of hormonal energy with hard-boiled sangfroid in a hyper-masculine trucking world. [Read](https://variety.com/2025/film/reviews/on-the-road-review-2-1236517840/) - **Screen Daily** (80/100, inferred): The critic describes the film as an erotically charged, noir-infused thriller where an unlikely same-sex romance flourishes in the most unpromising of environments. It blends trauma and tenderness into a tense, touching tale set in Mexico’s ultra-masculine trucking community. [Read](https://www.screendaily.com/reviews/on-the-road-review-venice-horizons-winner-is-taut-tender-tale-of-gay-mexican-drifter/5208712.article) ## Details - **Director:** David Pablos - **Director:** David Pablos - **Writer:** David Pablos - **Cinematography:** Ximena Amann - **Editor:** Jonathan Pellicer, Paulina del Paso - **Music:** Andrea Balency-Béarn - **Production design:** Belén Estrada - **Producer:** Inna Payán, Luis Salinas, Diego Luna - **Cast:** Victor Prieto Simental as Veneno; Osvaldo Sánchez as El Muñeco; Mariano López Sosa as El Eulas; Héctor Cárdenas as El Pelón; Obdulia Morales as Lupe; Elizabeth Infante as Licha; Victor Manuel Aguirre as Hombre Mayor; Giovanni Ontiveros as Omar - **Runtime:** 1h 33m - **Release (Sweden):** 24 January 2026 - **Genres:** Drama, Thriller, Crime - **Trailer:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92gV-ObLHos ## Where to watch in Sweden Not streaming, renting or buying in Sweden at the last check. Also available in: AR, BR, CL, CO, EC, MX, PA, PE, US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## Awards - Miami Film Awards 2026: Miami Film Awards (won) - Orizzonti 2025: Orizzonti (won) ## If you liked this - *Y tu mamá también* (2001), Fi1m 87: Two boys, a car and the Mexican road, shot with the same appetite and less menace. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/y-tu-mama-tambien.md) - *Stranger by the Lake* (2013): A gay romance where desire and danger sit at the same lakeside and nobody looks away. - *God's Own Country* (2017), Fi1m 84: Love between working men in a hard place, told with dirt under its nails. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/gods-own-country.md) - *Heli* (2013): Mexican violence filmed flat and slow, so it lands harder than any thriller. - *The Wages of Fear* (1953), Fi1m 90: Men, trucks, a murderous road, and tension measured in the length of a held shot. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/the-wages-of-fear.md) --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/film/on-the-road