STACK #239 September 2024

MOVIE FEATURE

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Rebel with a cause

In addition to being a photojournalist and the author of The Bikeriders ,

Danny Lyon is a civil rights activist who spent most of the 1960s documenting the struggle for equality amongst the African American community. As a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, he was present at the majority of historical events during the movement, capturing important moments on camera. He has also worked extensively documenting life inside the American prison system.

GET ON YOUR BIKE

The director of Mud and Midnight Special , Jeff Nichols, hits the road with an all-star cast in his new biker flick The Bikeriders . Words Gill Pringle

For Austin Butler, his job was a little easier, portraying a mysterious young man of few words who comes from a more affluent family than most of his fellow bikers. “He’s fallen out with his family and become a lone wolf. But there’s something in every human being that needs community. When he found the Vandals, he found a father figure in Johnny, and camaraderie with all the guys. “He and Kathy get married very quickly, but he’s always got one foot out the door. He doesn’t want anybody to need anything from him, but Kathy needs him to stop riding and get out of that life, and Johnny needs Benny to take over the gang,” explains the Elvis and Dune: Part Two actor. Butler actually grew up around motorcycles - both his father and grandfather being bike riders. “When I was 16, my dad decided it was time for me to learn, so he just threw me on a bike in a parking lot. After I spoke to Jeff (Nichols) about this role, I started riding all the time. Then, when I was in Australia shooting Elvis , I met a man who fixed up old Harleys and we would go riding together. That was my first time getting on an older bike. It helped get me ready for the film.”

A gritty and uncompromising look at the rise and fall of America’s notorious outlaw motorcycle clubs, the film traces the origins of the fictional biker gang the Vandals through the eye of its founding members. Inspired by photojournalist Danny Lyon’s seminal 1968 book, written during four years that he spent with the Chicago Outlaws Motorcycle Club,

Jodie Comer and Austin Butler

the film explores firsthand how a group of speed-loving outsiders morphs into a fearsome criminal gang. At the heart of the story is Jodie Comer’s strong-willed Kathy who, after a chance encounter at a local bar, finds

“I love that she narrates the film and the stories are told from her perspective,” says Comer, who also met

herself inextricably drawn to Austin Butler’s Benny, the newest member of the midwestern motorcycle club led by the enigmatic Johnny (Tom Hardy). Liverpool-born Comer immediately

with the book’s author. “Danny told me she felt things quite deeply, she was very articulate and very smart. I don’t know if she saw herself that way, but she seems very good at saying exactly what she feels.” With much of the film’s extensive narration being adapted from the real

Director Jeff Nichols (centre) with Jodie and Austin

went to work on her accent - an important aspect of The Bikeriders given how her character also narrates the film. Listening to audio interviews of Kathy,

Kathy’s taped interviews, director/writer Jeff Nichols says, “Kathy has a unique cadence in the way she speaks. She’s funny and self deprecating and has a very strong working class Chicago accent. Jodie captured that exactly. I’ve played the interviews for

Comer was delighted to discover her to be a woman who always says exactly what she thinks.

Tom Hardy keeps props from each film he makes. For The Bikeriders he took a motorcycle. DYK?

“I completely fell in love with her,” says the actress best known for her role as femme fatale Villanelle in TV’s Killing Eve .

• The Bikeriders is out Sep 11

audiences at festival screenings and they are dumbfounded by how accurate her dialect is. It’s uncanny,”.

52 SEPTEMBER 2024

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