Two Wheels On Two Reels: A History of Biker Movies
Two Wheels on Two Reels: A History of Biker Movies
THE CW LIBRARY
JUDGING BY THE PHOTO ON THE BACK COVER OF THIS book, author Mike Seate is a great big guy. That’s lucky for both of us, because if he wasn’t twice my size I’d punch his lights out. Why?
Because he and his inside knowledge and relentless research have shattered one of my favorite illusions...or perhaps not. We’ll get to that.
But first, as the title proclaims, this book is a col lection of essays and reviews and sources for biker movies. Not just the class-B dreadfuls of drive-in fame, but the really early examples (try 1935, no kidding), the chopper flicks-serious and otherwise-the pretentious films and even the genre’s sole Oscar winner.
No surprise, the book begins with The Wild One, and that’s where my heartbreak began. As surely everyone knows by now, Marlon Brando was the sensitive outlaw and Lee Marvin was the boorish lout. Naturally, being 17 and the owner of a flathead Harley, I identified with Marvin’s Chino.
He wore a striped jersey, red and yellow, and when I saw one, I got it. Pride of my otherwise-undistinguished wardrobe, it was.
So there I was, reading this book and Seate says Chino’s jersey was yellow and blue. Blue?!
The King of the Sucker-Punchers, dressed like a Swedish flag?! He might as well drive a Volvo. Oh, as Chino would and did say, the shame!
Next, I checked the credits. Seate isn’t just a motojourno, he’s a newspaper columnist, writes about popular culture and reviews movies. So, I figured, the guy’s got inside stuff, knows folks I don’t, which means he’s checked facts I haven’t.
This seemed to be the case, as he’s got all manner of interesting facts, like Jack Nicholson appearing in two biker flicks before Easy Rider.
Plus Seate is a clever man, with at least one chuckle per page. One can question some of the sociological sections, but of course no two sidewalk sociologists agree anyway, so that’s no problem. And Seate does give due credit to On Any Sunday, the to-date lone attempt to present a motorcycle movie about real motorcyclists.
Nor need the reader agree with the reviews, because Seate has been thoughtful enough to include a choice of sources for the biker movies on video; if a movie sounds interesting, we can all watch for ourselves. ^ Concerning my hesitation, though, when I came to the chapter about racing, I was dis^ mayed to read that “Speedway was a forerunner of American flat-track racing,” which, of course, it wasn’t.
Then, Seate watches the interview of Kenny Roberts Sr. in his first year overseas and says Roberts, who went on to win the world title, “seems oddly mature for an untested rookie rider.” Say what? This after Roberts had spent seven seasons banging bars with Gary Scott and Jay Springsteen and had won the AMA championship twice. Calm? Rookie? Roberts was cherrypicking. Of course he was calm. Meanwhile, when a man who seems to know everything doesn’t know
it all in subjects you know, p’raps he has other gaps in his knowledge.
So, while this is a good piece of work, and a prime source for further research, and while he and I and all bike nuts agree that the biker movie we want most has yet to be made, I’m keeping my red and yellow jersey.
-Allan Girdler
Two Wheels on Two Reels: A History of Biker Movies, Mike Seate, 111 pages, $15; Whitehorse Press, 107 E. Conway Rd., N. Conway, NH 03860; 800/531-1133; www.whitehorsepress.com
