A father wakes his two children in the middle of the night and guides them along the roads of the Midwest without telling them where they’re headed. Behind this improvised journey, a far more serious family crisis slowly comes into focus. On the Road to Omaha, the feature debut of Cole Webley, hits French cinemas on July 22, 2026.
The film follows Ella and her younger brother Charlie, as their father hustles them into a car after they flee their home in a hurry. While the kids watch the changing scenery and the people they meet along the way with curiosity, their father remains silent, preoccupied and unable to explain what lies ahead in Omaha. Ella gradually realizes that this road trip is nothing like a vacation.
Written by Robert Machoian, the filmmaker behind The Killing of Two Lovers, the story unfolds against the backdrop of the 2008 American financial crisis. This road movie lays bare the real consequences of precarity, grief, and isolation on a family with no easy way out. The plot hinges on the rift between the children’s still carefree perspective and the difficult choices their father is forced to confront.
John Magaro, notably seen in Past Lives, stars as a father whose motives remain hard to pin down for a long stretch. He shares the screen with the young Molly Belle Wright and Wyatt Solis, in the roles of Ella and Charlie, as well as with Talia Balsam.
Presented in competition at the Sundance Film Festival 2025, Sur la route d’Omaha fits into the tradition of American indie dramas that use travel as a lens on family and social tensions. Its trailer leans into silence, the landscapes it traverses, and the children’s reactions, without immediately revealing what drives their father to hit the road.
The film is geared mainly toward audiences drawn to intimate family dramas and socially conscious narratives built around a moral dilemma, rather than the traditional tropes of an adventure road movie.
On the Road to Omaha, with a runtime of 1h23, is being distributed in France by Condor Distribution and hits cinemas on July 22, 2026.
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