♣ Easy Rider
Friday 27 April 2007

from wikipedia:

Along with Arthur Penn's Bonnie and Clyde, Easy Rider helped kick-start an artistic renaissance in Hollywood during the late sixties and early seventies. The major studios realised that money could be made from low-budget films made by directors with artistic intentions. Heavily influenced by the French New Wave, the films of the so-called "Hollywood Renaissance" came to represent a generation increasingly disillusioned with their government and the world.

This film was something of a mixed bag for me; better overall than I expected it would be, but a lot more self-aware, as well, which I found to be quite limiting. Some good performances, this 1969 film is all about that great American preoccupation: the road. Journeying down the road, Billy and Captain Jack head off on initially a financially-provoked basis, but find by the end that there journey has had a more important, spiritual aspect, and one that they have not truly embraced or learnt from. In all honesty, the plot is fairly inconsequential, the film is far more concerned with the problems faced by the two men, their solutions, and the relationships they build up on the way. In this respect it's quintessentially 60's. There is perhaps a little bit too much hippy-style preaching for the modern watcher, and the whole film is certainly a child of it's time. Billy and Captain America very early on pick up a stranger who they dutifully return to his commune. It's actually quite a pathetic scene for the flower-power brigade in all honesty. The commune the scene is set at is populated by 'city kids' according to the stranger, and we watch them futiley spreading seed in the thin, dusty soil of a dry earth. The two motorcycle riders see the absurdity of their quest, but nonetheless hold a certain respect for the group.
No, I mean it, you've got a nice place. It's not every man that can live off the land, you know. You do your own thing in your own time. You should be proud.
 However, it is quite easy to feel that, in a way these individuals, searching for some kind of plug to fill their lives have not quite understood the ethos of living your own way, of ethical libertarianism which the two bikers seem to have found. Instead for them is a kind of going through the motions facade of freedom. The commune seems to have swallowed the image of the hippy itself as free-living, and rather overlooked the spiritual ramifications. When they ask for, 'simple food for simple people' it is hard not to think that they too have taken up a stereotypical role in society quite like the corporates and yuppies they claim to despise. The unavoidable reference to the overpowering tyranny of the state comes in the form, of all things, a float parade. The two protagonists join in and are promptly arrested for not having a liscence. The message clearly is that even in a time of celebration, the government can't allow for the free-spirited and non-conformists to do as they please. Whilst frankly I am too tired to write about the entire story, let's just say Jack Nicholas has a ver convincing and charming role, though sadly is beaten to death in his sleep when sleeping rough with the other two (note, not copulating with them, merely engaging in the act of sleep nearby for all you slight perverts). This mindless brutality of the conformist masses (we are led to beleive that a group seen earlier threataning the travellers are responsible, one of whom is a policeman) is shown to me violent and counter-productive; the only person who survives is a fairly conservative Nicholas, so conservative he very doggedly tries to avoid smoking grass by the campfire in an earlier scene, saying, 'it leads onto harder things.' The ending of the film is the triumph. Having sucessfully transported drugs and as a result made a small fortune, Billy brags of their voctory, whilst Wyatt (Captain America) merely wonders at where they went wrong:

Billy: We did it, man. We did it, we did it. We're rich, man. We're retirin' in Florida now, mister.
Wyatt: You know Billy, we blew it.

In the final scene, both men are presumed to be dead after a drive by shooting and an explosion. It's a fairly pessimistic note to end on, but at least an honest one. Travelling the road or living in communes itself is not simply enough. Without the spiritual consideration of man, all these acts are hollow. Plus I love any movie which doesn't make me want to drink epicac and run screaming for the doors with optimism. Overall, it's a good movie, an interesting movie, but perhaps a bit too pretentious for it's own good. Subtelty is not this film's strength, but the messages it does get across are often well considered and powerful. One final note must be made concerning the cinematography of a number of drug-based scenes. Shot on 16mm, and using harsh, dischordant sound and sudden cuts, the screen envelops us in the madness of the trip; arguably a paradigm of the far longer lasting 'trip' the pair of bikers take, with all its twists and turns. Good stuff, and very effective.

Fezwearer's verdict? 3 1/2 Feztastic cymbal-clapping monkey butlers

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posted by danny @ 17:34,

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