STACK #242 December 2024

FEATURE MOVIE

The movie Easy Rider perfectly evoked the counterculture and generation gap of the late 1960s, exactly the way the James Dean movie Rebel Without a Cause captured the restless beatnik youth of the mid-1950s. Words Bob J

THE EASY RIDER EFFECT: Biker movies rushed to market The Sidehackers aka Five the Hard Way (1969)

Hell’s Belles (1969) Hell’s Angels ’69 (1969) Naked Angels (1969) Run, Angel, Run! (1969) Satan’s Sadists (1969) Sisters in Leather 1969) Angel Unchained (1970) Angels Die Hard (1970) Little Fauss and Big Halsy (1970) The Losers (1970) Angels Hard as They Come (1971) The Proud Rider (1971)

Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper

Dennis Hopper, Peter Fonda, and Jack Nicholson

basics to have some commercial elements,

agreed to put up a modest budget of

P eter Fonda and Dennis Hollywood by ushering in a new wave of cinema that influenced other maverick and independent moviemakers such as George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola, and Martin Scorsese. It was Fonda who originally came up with the idea for a modern western movie, riding motorcycles instead of horses. He soon interested his close friends Hopper and screenwriter Terry Southern, who between them roughed up a screenplay originally titled The Loners . Their characters Billy (Hopper) and Wyatt ”Captain America” (Fonda) - based on Billy the Kid and Wyatt Earp of Wild West fame - are two disillusioned, freedom-loving bikers alienated from society. After smuggling a huge Hopper’s low budget hippie biker film revolutionised

The two actors originally approached exploitation movie director Roger Corman to finance their movie, but he considered Hopper a foul-mouthed

$360,000 and in return would receive a third of the film’s profit. But, as director Hopper and company began shooting the film, it became clear to all involved that the now retitled Easy Rider was something much more than a quick-hit exploitation movie. As their road journey progresses, Billy and Wyatt’s long hair and bohemian clothes prompt provocation and spiteful harassment from Southern townsfolk. This leads to them both being arrested on a minor charge by the local sheriff. Enter the eccentric and alcoholic civil rights lawyer George Hanson who, after bailing them out, decides to join the duo on their freedom ride. The part was originally written for actor Rip Torn, but due to his last-minute withdrawal, the role was offered to and accepted by the then practically unknown actor Jack Nicholson (ironically, from Roger Corman’s stable). His stunning breakout performance lit up the screen and his extraordinary acting skills would go on to dominate the movies of the ’70s. With cinematographer Laszlo

Australian cinema bill (1969)

Kovacs’s incredible vistas of the American Southwest serving as a memorable backdrop, a number of popular rock anthems as the film’s soundtrack, and a tragic finale, when released, Easy Rider became an immediate

amount of cocaine across the Mexican border and selling it for a profit to a big Los Angeles drug dealer (a

A low-budget sequel was made in 2012, titled Easy Rider: The Ride Back , which chronicled the family of Wyatt ”Captain America” Williams from the 1940s to the present day. DYK?

loose cannon and consequently turned down their offer. Rebuffed, they then took their project to the small movie company Raybert (a subsidiary of Columbia Pictures) who

• Easy Rider is out Dec 4

smash hit, eventually raking in $60 million worldwide (that equates to $518 million today). The film also received two Academy Award nominations - Fonda, Hopper and Southern for ’Best Story and Screenplay’ and Jack Nicholson for ’Best Supporting Actor.’

Phil Spector cameo role)

they hit the road to New Orleans for the Mardi Gras

festival. Whilst on their journey Billy and Wyatt encounter both friends and foes.

had created the popular television series The Monkees . Raybert, believing the film’s

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