Frank Capra · 1934 · road

Frank Capra's 1934 romance, the first film to sweep all five major Oscars and the template for a thousand road movies and rom-coms since. A runaway heiress and a wisecracking reporter make their reluctant way by bus and thumb up the East Coast from Miami to New York, falling in love against their better judgement the whole way.

1. 1
   Miami

   Spoiled heiress Ellie Andrews leaps from her father's yacht in Miami and boards a northbound bus, fleeing to the husband he forbade.

2. 2
   Jacksonville

   She loses her bag and her ticket, and falls in with Peter Warne, a brash out-of-work reporter who smells a story.

3. 3
   The Auto Camp

   At a roadside auto camp they hang a blanket between the beds - the Walls of Jericho - and pretend not to fall in love.

4. 4
   The Open Road

   Stranded and broke, Ellie out-hitchhikes the expert with a flash of her leg, and a passing car squeals to a halt.

5. 5
   Dyke's Auto Camp

   A New Jersey motor court on the last night, close enough to drive into the city and back before dawn. Peter goes to sell the story and raise the money to marry her; she wakes to an empty cabin and thinks he has sold her out.

6. 6
   New York

   The newspaper office, where Peter takes his editor's cheque and runs for the door - and misses Ellie on the road, passing her father's police escort going the other way without knowing she is in it.

7. 7
   Long Island

   The Andrews estate, and a second wedding to King Westley staged properly this time - until her father tells her at the altar what Peter actually asked for, which was thirty-nine dollars sixty in expenses and nothing else.

8. 8
   Glen Falls

   A motor court in Michigan, a battered Model T outside, and a telegram to her father reading let em topple - and the blanket comes down at last, which is the ending everybody remembers and nobody realises is in Michigan.