Easy Rider Movie Review

This movie review sponsored by: Rim Chiropractic

In the early 1960’s, Peter Fonda found himself following in his famous father Henry’s footsteps and pursuing his own acting career. However, the more that turbulent decade wore on, the more Peter found himself openly rejecting the Hollywood establishment. As a result, his acting career began to suffer.

Then, in 1966, when B-movie movie mogul Roger Corman became interested in making a film about the Hell’s Angels, he thought Peter’s growing outlaw status fit the bill perfectly. Corman cast him as biker gang leader “Heavenly Blues” in the resulting movie “The Wild Angels”, and it proved to be a huge hit, spawning many biker movie imitators well into the following decade.

The success of that movie compelled Roger Corman to pursue more film projects concerning the growing counterculture movement. He became interested in a movie project that would explore the psychedelic effects of LSD, and once again enlisted Fonda to play the lead. Corman also hired a relatively unknown actor named Jack Nicholson, whose acting career was similarly suffering, as the film’s screenwriter. He also cast another actor with a reputation for being a troublemaker named Dennis Hopper in a supporting role. The resulting movie from 1967 was called “The Trip” and became another resounding commercial success.

However, Peter Fonda in particular was disappointed with the movie despite its commercial success, and it sparked inspiration in the young actor. Interested in creating a “modern day western” with outlaws riding motorcycles rather than horses across the country, Fonda enlisted his “The Trip” co-star Dennis Hopper to realize the idea, with Hopper directing and Fonda producing. When Rip Torn backed out of the movie role of Southern lawyer George Hanson after a heated confrontation with Hopper, the pair cast “The Trip”‘s screenwriter Nicholson in the part, giving the iconic actor his breakout role. Little did the trio realize the extent to which they were about to make film history.

Titled “Easy Rider” by co-screenwriter Terry Southern, the plot itself concerns two bikers named Billy (Dennis Hopper) and Wyatt a.k.a. “Captain America” (Peter Fonda) who make a highly profitable cocaine deal with their stateside connection (played by music producer Phil Spector). They decide to use the profits to take to the road with their motorcycles and head for Mardi Gras in New Orleans before retiring to Florida. Along the way, they discover America to be a far more complicated and dark terrain than they had initially imagined. It isn’t long before they find their idealism is shattered by the tragic events that unfold before them.

When it was released in 1969, the movie became an immediate sensation, eventually grossing around $60 million dollars off a budget of less than $400,000. It was a non-Hollywood effort that surprised everyone, especially the Hollywood community, as this anti-establishment effort obviously struck a chord with the growing youth movement. Featuring a low-budget documentary shooting style paired with an up-to-the minute rock soundtrack, it created a national sensation while thumbing its nose at the status quo.

The movie was groundbreaking in a number of ways. Most movies at the time would use a musical score, for example, and director Hopper had originally hired Crosby, Stills and Nash to write one for the movie. However, when the seriously rebellious Hopper saw the trio of musicians riding in a limousine, he angrily denounced their “decadent” ways and decided against it.

Instead, editor Donn Cambern used music from his own record collection to edit sequences into what was considered a temporary soundtrack. When Hopper and Fonda saw the dramatic effect these contemporary songs had in the movie, they decided to keep them in, and the licensing costs more than tripled the film’s budget. It was an inspired decision, as the contemporary rock soundtrack gives the film an undeniable energy as well as perfectly expressing the counterculture’s growing influence, creating a time capsule of a certain time period in the process.

Director Hopper also used radical editing techniques such as flashing between two different scenes during transitions that were more reminiscent of the experimental techniques of European filmmakers than anything seen in Hollywood. Employing these artistically daring methods most certainly helped the film secure a First Film Award during the 1969 Cannes Film Festival, and only added to its reputation as a modern classic.

Hopper also encouraged the film’s actors to improvise much of their dialogue, rather than strictly following the film’s screenplay by Hopper, Fonda, and Terry Southern. The result gives the movie a degree of realism and accurately captures how people actually spoke at the time rather than the artificial nature of strict line readings. It provides the film with a cultural accuracy that adds to the film’s laid-back atmosphere, giving it an almost documentary-like quality.

Meanwhile, a scene shot in a New Orleans cemetery as Wyatt and Billy shared an LSD trip with a pair of charming prostitutes (Karen Black and Toni Basil) gave Fonda and Hopper the opportunity to fix what they saw as “The Trip”s sensationalistic treatment of a psychedelic experience. The experimental sequence proved to be a touchstone in the film, combining emotionally harrowing moments with bizarre visuals and adventurous editing that makes for a mesmerizing experience.

Perhaps best of all, the movie refused to view the growing youth movement solely through rose-colored glasses as an idealistic, perfect vision for the future. Instead, they chose to confront the darker side of this cultural shift as well, including society’s violent resistance to change and fearful reactions to true examples of personal freedom. Never is this more apparent than at the end of the movie when the film blindsides you with a shocking conclusion that serves as a devastating commentary on fear and intolerance in American society. If there is one single movie that best epitomizes the dramatic cultural shifts in America on the 1960’s, you’d be hard pressed to find a better example than the classic “Easy Rider”.

“Easy Rider” is playing for its 50th anniversary for one night only at Blue Jay Cinema as part of its Classics Series on Wednesday, November 13th. It is rated R.