Easy Rider is a 1969 American road movie written by Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper, and Terry Southern, produced by Fonda and directed by Hopper. It tells the story of two bikers (played by Fonda and Hopper) who travel through the American Southwest and South with the aim of asserting their freedom. The success of Easy Rider helped spark the New Hollywood phase of filmmaking during the late sixties. The film was added to the Library of Congress National Registry in 1998.

A landmark counterculture film,^[2] and a "touchstone for a generation" that "captured the national imagination,"^[3] Easy Rider explores the societal landscape, issues, and tensions in the United States during the 1960s, such as the rise and fall of the hippie movement, drug use, and communal lifestyle. Easy Rider is famous for its use of real drugs in its portrayal of marijuana and other substances.^[4]

Plot[link]

The protagonists are two freewheeling hippies: Wyatt (Fonda), nicknamed "Captain America", and Billy (Hopper). Fonda and Hopper said that these characters' names refer to Wyatt Earp and Billy the Kid.^[4] Wyatt dresses in American flag-adorned leather, while Billy dresses in Native American-style buckskin pants and shirts and a bushman hat. The former is appreciative of help and of others, while the latter is often hostile and leery of outsiders.

After smuggling cocaine from Mexico to Los Angeles, Wyatt and Billy sell their contraband to "Connection," a man (played by Phil Spector) in a Rolls-Royce and score a large sum of money. With the money from the sale stuffed into a plastic tube hidden inside the Stars & Stripes-adorned fuel tank of Wyatt's California-style chopper, they ride eastward in an attempt to reach New Orleans, Louisiana, in time for Mardi Gras.

During their trip, Wyatt and Billy meet and have a meal with a rancher, whom Wyatt admires for his simple, traditional farming lifestyle. Later, the duo pick up a hitch-hiker (Luke Askew) and agree to take him to his commune, where they stay for a day. Life in the commune appears to be hard, with hippies from the city finding it difficult to grow their own crops in a dry climate with poor soil and little rainfall. (One of the children seen in the commune is played by Fonda's four-year-old daughter Bridget.) At one point, the bikers witness a prayer for blessing of the new crop, as put by a communard: A chance "to make a stand", and to plant "simple food, for our simple taste". The commune is also host to a traveling theater group that "sings for its supper" (performs for food). The notion of "free love" appears to be practiced, with two women seemingly sharing the affections of the hitch-hiking communard, and who then turn their attention to Wyatt and Billy. The hitch-hiker wants the two bikers to stay at the commune, saying, "the time is now", to which Wyatt replies "I'm hip about time...but I gotta go." As the bikers leave, the hitch-hiker (known only as "Stranger on highway" in the credits) gives Wyatt some LSD for him to share with "the right people".

While jokingly riding along with a parade in a small town, the pair are arrested by the local authorities for "parading without a permit" and thrown in jail. In jail, they befriend American Civil Liberties Union lawyer and local drunk George Hanson (Jack Nicholson). George helps them get out of jail, and decides to travel with Wyatt and Billy to New Orleans. As they camp that night, Wyatt and Billy introduce George to marijuana. As an alcoholic and a "square", George is reluctant to try the marijuana ("It leads to harder stuff", and "I don't want to get hooked"), but he quickly relents.

While attempting to eat in a small rural Louisiana restaurant, the trio's appearance attracts the attention of the locals. The girls in the restaurant want to meet the men and ride with them, but the local men and police officer make mocking, racist, and homophobic remarks. One of the men menacingly states, "I don't believe they'll make the parish line." As the waitress does not take their order Wyatt, Billy, and George leave without eating and make camp outside of town. The events of the day cause George to comment: "This used to be a hell of a good country. I can't understand what's gone wrong with it." He observes that Americans talk a lot about the value of freedom, but are actually afraid of anyone who truly exhibits it.

In the middle of the night, the local men find the trio asleep and brutally assault them. Billy manages to scare off the attackers by yelling and brandishing a knife. Wyatt and Billy suffer minor injuries, but George has been killed. Wyatt and Billy wrap George's body up in his sleeping bag, gather his belongings, and vow to return the items to his parents.

They continue to New Orleans and find the brothel George had intended to visit. Taking prostitutes Karen (Karen Black) and Mary (Toni Basil) with them, Wyatt and Billy decide to go outside and wander the parade-filled street of the Mardi Gras celebration. They end up in a cemetery, where all four ingest LSD. They experience a psychedelic bad trip infused with Catholic prayer, represented through quick edits, sound effects, and over-exposed film.

Peter Fonda's American Flag Patch, sold for $89,625 in 2007

Making camp afterward, Wyatt declares: "We blew it." Wyatt realizes that their search for freedom, while financially successful,^{[clarification needed]} was a spiritual failure. The next morning, the two are continuing their trip to Florida (where they hope to retire wealthy) when two rednecks in a pickup truck spot them and decide to "scare the hell out of them" with their shotgun. As they pull alongside Billy, one of the men lazily aims the shotgun at him and threatens and insults him by saying, "Want me to blow your brains out?" and "Why don't you get a haircut?" When Billy flips his middle finger up at them, the hillbilly fires the shotgun at Billy, who immediately hits the pavement, seriously wounded in the side. As the truck then takes off past Wyatt down the road, Wyatt turns around and races back to put his jacket over his fatally injured friend, who is already covered in blood, before riding off for help. But by this time, the same pickup truck has turned around and closes on Wyatt. Not wanting any witnesses to report them to the police, the hillbilly fires at Wyatt as he speeds by the pickup, hitting the bike's gas tank and causing it to instantly erupt into a fiery explosion. Wyatt lands by the side of the road, dead. As the murderous rednecks drive away, the film ends with a shot of the flaming bike in the middle of the deserted road, as the camera ascends to the sky.

Cast[link]

Production[link]

When seeing a still of himself and Bruce Dern in The Wild Angels, Peter Fonda had the idea of a modern Western, involving two bikers travelling around the country and eventually getting shot by hillbillies. He called Dennis Hopper, and the two decided to turn that into a movie, The Loners, with Hopper directing, Fonda producing, and both starring and writing. They brought in screenwriter Terry Southern, who came up with the title Easy Rider. The film was mostly shot without a screenplay, with ad-libbed lines, and production started with only the outline and the names of the protagonists. Keeping the Western theme, Wyatt was named after Wyatt Earp and Billy after Billy the Kid.^[5]

During test shooting on location in New Orleans, Hopper fought with the production's ad hoc crew for control. At one point he entered into a physical confrontation with photographer Barry Feinstein, who was one of the camera operators for the shoot. After this turmoil, Hopper and Fonda decided to assemble a proper crew for the rest of the film.^[4]

Allegedly, the characters of Wyatt and Billy were respectively based on Roger McGuinn and David Crosby of The Byrds.^[6] According to Terry Southern's biographer, Lee Hill, the part of George Hanson had been written for Southern's friend, actor Rip Torn. When Torn met with Hopper and Fonda at a New York restaurant in early 1968 to discuss the role, Hopper began ranting about the "rednecks" he had encountered on his scouting trip to the South. Torn, a Texan, took exception to some of Hopper's remarks, and the two almost came to blows, as a result of which Torn withdrew from the project. Torn was replaced by Jack Nicholson, whom Hopper had recently appeared with in Head (along with another Easy Rider co-star, Toni Basil)^[7]. In 1994, Jay Leno interviewed Hopper about Easy Rideron The Tonight Show, and during the interview, Hopper alleged that Torn had pulled a knife on him during the altercation, prompting Torn to sue Hopper successfully for defamation.^[5]

The hippie commune was recreated from pictures and shot near Santa Monica, California overlooking Malibu Canyon, since the New Buffalo commune near Taos in Arroyo Hondo, New Mexico did not permit shooting there.^[8]

A short clip near the beginning of the film shows Wyatt and Billy on Route 66 in Flagstaff, Arizona, passing a large figure of a lumberjack. That lumberjack statue - once situated in front of the Lumberjack Cafe - remains in Flagstaff, but now stands inside the J. Lawrence Walkup Skydome on the campus of Northern Arizona University.^[9] A second, very similar statue was also moved from the Lumberjack Cafe to the exterior of the Skydome.^[10]

Most of the film is shot outside with natural lighting. Hopper said all the outdoor shooting was an intentional choice on his part, because "God is a great gaffer." The production used two five-ton trucks, one for the equipment and one for the motorcycles, with the cast and crew in a motor home.^[8] One of the locations was Monument Valley.^[8]

The restaurant scenes with Fonda, Hopper, and Nicholson were shot in Morgan City, Louisiana.^[8] The men and girls in that scene were all Morgan locals.^[8] In order to inspire more vitriolic commentary from the local men, Hopper told them the characters of Billy, Wyatt, and George had raped and killed a girl outside of town.^[4] The scene in which Billy and Wyatt were shot was filmed on Louisiana Highway 105 North, just outside of Krotz Springs, Louisiana, and the two other men in the scene - Johnny David and D.C. Billedeau - were Krotz Springs locals.

While shooting the cemetery scene, Hopper tried to convince Fonda to talk to the statue of the Madonna as though it were Fonda's mother (who had committed suicide when he was 10 years old) and ask her why she left him. Although Fonda was reluctant, he eventually complied. Later, Fonda used the inclusion of this scene as leverage to persuade Roger McGuinn to allow the use of his cover of Bob Dylan's "It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)".^[4]

Despite being filmed in the first half of 1968, roughly between Mardi Gras and the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, with production starting on February 22^[11] the film did not have a U.S. premiere until July 1969, after having won an award at the Cannes film festival in May. The delay was partially due to a protracted editing process. Inspired by 2001: A Space Odyssey', one of Hopper's proposed cuts was 220 minutes long, including extensive use of the "flash-forward" narrative device, wherein scenes from later in the movie are inserted into the current scene. But only one flash-forward survives in the final edit: when Wyatt in the New Orleans brothel has a premonition of the final scene. At the request of Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider, Henry Jaglom was brought in to edit the film into its current form, while Schneider purchased Hopper a trip to Taos so he would not interfere with the recut. Upon seeing the final cut, Hopper was originally displeased, saying that his movie was "turned into a TV show", but he eventually accepted, claiming that Jaglom had crafted the film the way Hopper had originally intended. Despite the large part he played in shaping the film, Jaglom only received credit as an "Editorial Consultant".^[5]

Motorcycles[link]

Replicas of the Captain America bike and Billy Bike at the Harley-Davidson Museum.^[12]

The motorcycles for the film, based on hardtail frames and panhead engines, were designed and built by two African-American^[13] chopper builders - Cliff Vaughs and Ben Hardy - following ideas of Peter Fonda, and handled by Tex Hall and Dan Haggerty during shooting.^[14]

In total, four former police bikes were used in the film. The 1949, 1950 and 1952 Harley Davidson Hydra-Glide bikes were purchased at an auction for $500, equivalent to about $3300 in current money. Each bike had a backup to make sure that shooting could continue in case one of the old machines failed or got wrecked accidentally. One "Captain America" was demolished in the final scene, while the other three were stolen and probably taken apart before their significance as movie props became known. The demolished bike was rebuilt by Dan Haggerty and shown in a museum. He sold it at an auction in 2001. It now resides at the National Motorcycle Museum in Anamosa, Iowa. Many replicas have been built since the film’s release.^[14]

Hopper and Fonda hosted a wrap party for the movie and then realized they had not shot the final campfire scene. Thus, it was shot after the bikes had already been stolen, which is why they are not visible in the background as in the other campfire scenes.^[5][14]

Significance[link]

A box office smash with a $41 million intake (becoming the third highest grossing film of 1969), along with Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate, Easy Rider helped kick-start the New Hollywood phase during the late 1960s and early 1970s.^[15] The major studios realized that money could be made from low-budget films made by avant-garde directors. Heavily influenced by the French New Wave, the films of the so-called "post-classical Hollywood" came to represent a counterculture generation increasingly disillusioned with its government as well as the government's effects on the world at large, the Establishment.^[15] Although Jack Nicholson appears only as a supporting actor and in the last half of the film, the standout performance signaled his arrival as a movie star,^[15] along with his subsequent film Five Easy Pieces in which he had the lead role.

The film's success, and the new era of Hollywood that it helped usher in, gave Hopper the chance to direct again with complete artistic control. The result was 1971's The Last Movie, which was a notable box office and critical failure, effectively ending Hopper's career as a director for well over a decade.

Awards and honors[link]

Hopper received the First Film Award (Prix de la première œuvre) at the 1969 Cannes Film Festival.^[16] At the Academy Awards, Jack Nicholson was nominated for Best Actor in a Supporting Role, and the film was also nominated for Best Writing, Story and Screenplay Based on Material Not Previously Published or Produced.

The film appears at number 88 on the American Film Institute's list of 100 Years, 100 Movies. In 1998, Easy Rider was added to the United States National Film Registry, having been deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."

Music[link]

The movie's "groundbreaking"^[17] soundtrack featured The Band, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, and Steppenwolf.^[17] Editor Donn Cambern used various music from his own record collection to make watching hours of bike footage more interesting during editing.^[8] Most of Cambern's music was used, with licensing costs of $1 million, more than the film's budget.^[8] When CSN viewed a rough cut of the film, they assured Hopper that they could not do any better than he already had.

Bob Dylan was asked to contribute music, but was reluctant to use his own recording of "It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)", so a version performed by Byrds frontman Roger McGuinn was used, instead. Also, instead of writing an entirely new song for the film, Dylan simply wrote out the first verse of “Ballad of Easy Rider” and told the filmmakers, “Give this to McGuinn, he’ll know what to do with it.” McGuinn completed the song and performed it in the film.

Home media[link]

The film was released by The Criterion Collection in November 2010 as part of the box set, America Lost and Found: The BBS Story. It included two audio commentaries, one featuring actor-director-writer Dennis Hopper, the other Hopper, actor-writer Peter Fonda, and production manager Paul Lewis, Born to Be Wild (1995) and “Easy Rider”: Shaking the Cage (1999), documentaries about the making and history of the film, television excerpts showing Hopper and Fonda at the Cannes Film Festival, and a new video interview with BBS cofounder Steve Blauner.^[18]

See also[link]

• American Dream
• Hippie exploitation films
• Method acting
• Outlaw biker film

References[link]

Notes[link]

Bibliography[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Easy Rider

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Easy Rider (film)

• Easy Rider at the Internet Movie Database
• Easy Rider at the TCM Movie Database
• Easy Rider at AllRovi
• Easy Rider at Rotten Tomatoes
• Easy Rider on Filmsite.org
• Criterion Collection Essay by Matt Zoller Seitz
• Criterion Collection Essay by J. Hoberman
• The Easy Rider Road Trip: Retracing the Path of the Iconic Movie on Its 40th Anniversary