Review of Easy Rider (1969) by Thomas M — 02 Apr 2010

Perfect portrait/aged time capsule of the late 60's counter culture movement. And the people who opposed it. This is not exactly the most well thought out and tight of movies but its message is so loud and clear it doesn't matter.

This is the most famous of the existential road movies that were a popular sub genre of the time. A genre that for me personally is sorely missed. Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda did not get along on the set and by all accounts Mr.

Hopper was a obnoxious terror on the set starting fist fights, shooting scenes a hundred times, pulling a gun out on people to get them to do what he wanted, forcing Peter Fonda to discuss his mother onscreen (who recently commited suicide) for a sequence involving a New Orleans graveyard, out of control druge usage, telling Simon & Garfunkel they sucked and there music corporate controlled shit (meanwhile missing the irony that his "natural" picture was being made by Columbia Pictures).

Peter Fonda was too busy engaging in intercourse with every woman he came near and also using heavy amounts of LSD to be bothered to act in his role as the the sole producer of this film and shut Dennis Hopper down.

Jack Nicholson was just stoned out of his mind the entire time. But what emerged out of chaos was, for once, sublime. A picture about two men who have their own unique vision of the American dream. And that is to sell a huge amount of cocaine and then drive down to Mardi Gras in New Orleans, Louisiana and piss it all away.

This is a study of people rebelling against what was considered the 'norm' of the time I.E. the lyrics to the Gene Austin song "My Blue Heaven" ("Just molly and me. And the baby makes three.

Were happy in my blue heaven") which is to say suburban hell. The soundtrack is just killer. Featuring Jimi Hendrix, Steppenwolf, The Byrds, and The Band (ALL ON CORPORATE CONTROLLED RECORD LABELS mr.

hopper!). The ending is one of the absolute greatest endings of all time. It involves a showdown between the free hippies and a bunch of backwards rednecks with guns and once you see it you'll know why the proposed 'sequel' would have just been a fantasy movie.

The ending 5 minutes make the best statement of the entire movie. Too bad there is still shit like that happening. And its too bad this film was more the byproduct of drugs and personal/political stands (not to mention its statement was 100% righteous) as neither Dennis Hopper nor Peter Fonda (Jack Nicholson was just a supporting actor player thoughout all this) never EVER came close to topping this.