Tagged: Biker
The Loveless: Willem Dafoe as Leather-clad Biker Vance
Willem Dafoe in The Loveless (1981)
Vitals
Willem Dafoe as Vance, lone biker and ex-convict
Rural Georgia, Summer 1959
Film: The Loveless
Release Date: August 7, 1981
Directed by: Kathryn Bigelow & Monty Montgomery
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
Happy 70th birthday to Willem Dafoe, the versatile actor born July 22, 1955, in Appleton, Wisconsin—not far from Sheboygan, where I just spent the weekend!
After an uncredited part cut from Michael Cimino’s ambitious 1980 Western epic Heaven’s Gate, Dafoe made his credited screen debut as the lead in The Loveless, which also marked the directorial debut of Kathryn Bigelow and Monty Montgomery, who co-wrote the screenplay.
Dafoe stars as Vance, a brooding biker who describes himself as “what you’d call… ragged,” joining up with his small gang at a truck stop off U.S. Highway 17 in Georgia, en route to Daytona to catch the NASCAR races. The year’s never stated, but context clues—like the cars, music, and 10¢ Cokes—suggest the summer of 1959, the same year Lee Petty won the first Daytona 500.
As in the film’s spiritual predecessor The Wild One (1953), the gang sparks mixed reactions from the townspeople: suspicion and fear from the older generation, curiosity and desire from the younger. As the sun sets and the tension rises, both visitors and locals grow increasingly drunk… and increasingly armed. Continue reading
Near Dark: Bill Paxton as a Vampire Biker
Bill Paxton in Near Dark (1987)
Vitals
Bill Paxton as Severen, vampire biker
Oklahoma to Kansas, Fall 1986
Film: Near Dark
Release Date: October 2, 1987
Director: Kathryn Bigelow
Costume Designer: Joseph A. Porro
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
Today would’ve been the 70th birthday of Bill Paxton, born May 17, 1955. After his uncredited screen debut in Jonathan Demme’s period crime flick Crazy Mama (1975), Paxton emerged as one of director James Cameron’s favorite supporting players through the 1980s and ’90s as seen in The Terminator (1984), Aliens (1986), True Lies (1994), and Titanic (1997).
Amidst these, Paxton also appeared as the memorably psychotic vampire Severen in Kathryn Bigelow’s solo directorial debut, the 1987 neo-Western horror film Near Dark. Despite an underwhelming initial box office performance, many contemporary critics praised the film—specifically Paxton’s “exceptional [performance]… as the undead sex symbol,” according to Jay Scott for The Globe and Mail. Near Dark has continued growing a cult following in the decades since its release. Continue reading
Dennis Hopper in Easy Rider
Dennis Hopper as Billy in Easy Rider (1969)
Vitals
Dennis Hopper as Billy, cowboy-styled biker and cocaine smuggler
Across the southern United States from Los Angeles through Louisiana, February 1968
Film: Easy Rider
Release Date: July 14, 1969
Director: Dennis Hopper
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
The late Dennis Hopper was born 86 years ago today on May 17, 1936. The iconoclastic filmmaker had been acting on screen since the ’50s before he made his directorial debut with the groundbreaking Easy Rider.
Filmed early in 1968 but not released until the tumultuous summer of ’69, Easy Rider had been conceptualized by Hopper with screenwriter Terry Southern and fellow actor Peter Fonda, who would join Hopper on screen as the pair of freedom-loving bikers we follow across the country following a lucrative cocaine sale. There’s plenty more drug use along the way, from a few LSD tabs scored from a fellow traveler to introducing the wild-eyed lawyer George Hanson (Jack Nicholson) to marijuana, but the substances are secondary as Easy Rider allegorizes the death—or, perhaps, the contemporary redefinition—of the American dream. Continue reading
Easy Rider: Peter Fonda as “Captain America”
Peter Fonda as “Captain America” in Easy Rider (1969)
Vitals
Peter Fonda as Wyatt, aka “Captain America”, freedom-loving biker
Across the southern United States from Los Angeles through Louisiana, February 1968
Film: Easy Rider
Release Date: July 14, 1969
Director: Dennis Hopper
WARNING! Spoilers ahead!
Background
When I learned the second Saturday of October is commemorated as National Motorcycle Ride Day, I realized I’d gone far too long without shining a sartorial lens on Dennis Hopper’s iconic cult classic, Easy Rider.
Conceptualized by Hopper, Fonda, and screenwriter Terry Southern, Easy Rider‘s chaotic production and controversial themes have been the product of considerable discussion since its release during that seminal summer of ’69. To some, it explores the death of the American dream through the concept of freedom, asking what it really means to be a free American.
Set to classic rock like The Byrds, Jimi Hendrix, Roger McGuinn, and Steppenwolf, we follow two bikers in their journey across the United States, from the open desert of the southwest into the close-knit conservative communities of the deep South. Hopper co-stars as the the mustached hippie rider Billy, but the arguable leader of the duo is the flag-bedecked Wyatt (Peter Fonda), celebrated by his pal as “Captain America”. After all, if a red, white, and blue-blooded Captain America can’t safely and freely ride across the nation, who can? Continue reading
The Wild One: Brando’s Motorcycle Jacket
Marlon Brando as Johnny Strabler in The Wild One (1953)
Vitals
Marlon Brando as Johnny Strabler, outlaw motorcycle club leader
Central California, Summer 1953
Film: The Wild One
Release Date: December 30, 1953
Director: László Benedek
Background
“Hey, Johnny, what are you rebelling against?”
“Whaddaya got?”
This famous exchange originated among the actual biker gangs that producer Stanley Kramer had brought on set to play themselves. When Kramer asked what it was they were “rebelling” against, a member cracked back to him, “Well, whaddaya got?” The line so encapsulated the culture and attitude of bikers during the era that it was incorporated into The Wild One, though the question is posed by Mildred, the platinum blonde beauty salon operator that one of Johnny’s boys picked up in a bar.
Inspired by actual events over a rambunctious fourth of July weekend in Hollister, California, in 1947, The Wild One was based on Frank Rooney’s short story “The Cyclists’ Raid” that appeared in Harper’s magazine in January 1951. It was swiftly adapted for the screen, though the locations involved were changed to the fictional California burgs of Carbondale and Wrightsville, the latter being the “screwball town”—according to Dextro (Jerry Paris)—where most of the action takes place.
The credits are a bit misleading, introducing Marlon Brando to us as The Wild One, though his character Johnny Strabler turns out to be the most restrained of his hell-raising confederates, particularly when compared to the obnoxious pipsqueak Mouse (Gil Stratton), the larcenous, simple-minded Pigeon (Alvy Moore), or rival gang leader Chino (Lee Marvin). Continue reading
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