Hells Angels on Wheels - Richard Rush - 1967

Where do we start? Well The Wild One (1953) I guess is the obvious year zero choice. Brando and his boys roll into small town Americana, shake up the squares, “What are you rebelling against?” “Whad’ya got?” etc. All good, but not quite there, Lee Marvin is pretty brutal, but they’re all riding Triumphs! Forget it. The rest of the 1950’s is all generalised teenage delinquency and Hot Rodders on chicken runs.

Suddenly though, the 60’s brings the real biker gangs! Grease stained romanticism, men of the road, free from the constraints of society man! Fightin’ and fuckin’ and chain whippin’ themselves into straight society’s consciousness. Who are these devils? Dr Thompson is certainly intrigued, enough so to write them into urban legend with Hells Angels: The Strange and Terrible Saga of the Motorcycle Outlaw Gangs (1966). Ok now our interest is piqued, and that goddamn’ Kenneth Anger’s Scorpio Rising (1964) sure ain’t doing no one no favours. It’s ok, it’s 1966, Roger Corman knows a scene ripe for exploitation when he sees one, The Wild Angels (1966) is released, records are broken, ladies and gentlemen we have a new movement to exploit, let’s get loaded and have a good time.

Over the next five or so years, a plethora of piteous ‘bikesploitation’ flicks were released, most of them it seems by sub z-grade schlock meister Al Adamson. The fact that Hells Angels on Wheels is one of the ‘gems’ of the genre says a lot.

The unique selling point of this picture at the time was its accreditation as the only biker picture ‘officially endorsed’ by the Hell’s Angels themselves. This approval is confirmed with a brief cameo from Sonny Barger, the leader of the Oakland chapter planting a smooch on an uncomfortable looking Adam Roarke during the opening credits. Its place in bikesploitation history now is maintained by the fact that the main star of the picture is a pre superstardom Jack Nicholson.

Nicholson played a bad boy biker in the same years risible The Rebel Rousers, a film so poor it didn’t actually get a release until three years later on the back of his fame in the most iconic bike pic of them all Easy Rider (1969). But here Uncle Jack plays ‘Poet’ a petrol station attendant drawn into the world of biker gangs after proving himself worthy in a ruck at a local bar. Unfortunately Poet takes an increasing liking to the leader Buddy’s (the aforementioned Roarke) gal, a few more rucks, rides, a wedding and a PG level orgy later, and everything comes to a tragic head.

Predictable enough stuff, and the usual problems that beset a lot of these biker movies remain evident here. There seemed to be much confusion between biker and hippy ethos for the makers of these flicks at the time, I can’t imagine that many of the Hell’s Angels spoke like beatniks and lived in bohemian enclaves with conceptual artists attending their socials. Our bikers are just a bit too clean cut, there is always one token beardy mentalist at the back of the pack, but in general the stars are just a bit too preppy, the chirpy jingle-jangle low rent psychedelia of the soundtrack hardly helps convey their menace either.

That said, as I implied, this is one of the better entries in the genre. Whilst Uncle Jack comes across too much like the existential everyman he would portray so well elsewhere, Adam Roarke manages a certain charm (that would carry him through several other biker pics, including The Losers (1970) with the magnificent high concept of a biker gang being sent to Vietnam to rescue a captured American agent) and brings a bit of excitement to the picture, the film also manages to move at a fair click, cramming in all the requisite signifiers of the genre, Richard Rush may be considered somewhat of a journeyman director but his pictures of the time (including Psych-Out (1968) a fantastic time capsule of a picture featuring several of this film’s cast and crew) always entertain.

The film’s strongest suite though is clearly the photography, and when you realise it was provided by a young Lazlo Kovacs (a personal hero who DP’d some of my favourite New Hollywood road movie pics such as Five Easy Pieces (1970), Slither (1973) and Paper Moon (1973)) it all makes sense. The camerawork is as frenetic and freewheeling at times as the shooting schedule would imply, whilst sun baked colour bursts from the screen time and time again, it may be cheap, but the film looks great.

The bikesploitation genre really isn’t worth the dedication idiots like me have put into watching them, see this and The Wild Angels, and you really don’t need to delve any further, as the budgets and the enjoyment factor quickly dropped through the floor for the shortly lived genre. Still, it’s better to burn out than fade away man...

Black Moon Rising - Harley Cokeliss - 1986

As time goes by, I find myself succumbing to nostalgic pangs for increasingly stereotypical joys of 80s/90s technology, you know the usual “remember when we all had to make cassette mixtapes rather than iTunes playlists, it was so much more individual etc”. This redundant longing for a more ‘innocent’ time came to mind again recently when thinking about how I had first seen Harley Cokeliss’ Black Moon Rising.

I’d finally got a TV for my very own room when I was 12, and oh the joys I had watching late night film showings on the four glorious channels we had back then. The amount of ‘discoveries’ I made just through pure chancing on short TV guide synopsis, stay up late, headphones in, glued to that cathode ray tube. BBC 1 playing the garish splatter end of Hammer films on a Friday night (think Twins of Evil (1971), Scars of Dracula (1970)), the mighty cult cinema bin that was Moviedrome on BBC 2, and the various mid budget 80’s & 90’s action and horror films ITV would fill the post 11pm void with, of which, for a while, this picture was a mainstay.

Some years later that I found out the story is actually credited to my first true film love John Carpenter, though further investigation showed that although he had written the script, it was as a hungry young filmmaker fighting for scraps in the early seventies. His influence therefore isn’t particularly noticeable in the finished product, only Lalo Schifrin’s synth ‘n’ drum pad laden score bears anything resembling his work.

The film’s plot follows Quint a professional thief doing a line in government espionage. If you’re expecting an Ethan Hunt type though you’ll be let down, Tommy Lee Jones’ blue collar burglar is more a post Lee Marvin cynical street tough, who would rather spend his time sinking a few in dive bars and pool halls.

His latest assignment has gone awry, and he finds himself hunted by rival Marvin (fans of Early 80’s US Hardcore will be excited to find that he’s played by Fear’s chief antagonist Lee Ving!) and in trouble with his government masters (represented by the late Bubba Smith A.K.A. Hightower!). Quint crosses paths with a trio of aspiring car producers, whose latest supercar project is subsequently stolen by a group of car thieves led by Nina (Linda Hamilton in the between Terminator’s doldrums) who in turn is in the service of corporate overlord Ed Ryland (Robert Vaughn, who mined a fine line in this sort of yuppie kingpin role during the 80’s).

The hiring of Quint to retrieve this supercar becomes the central focus of the plot, and oh what a piece of work the car is, it’s introduced to us screaming across desert flats at 300 mph in a complete knock off of the opening credits to Knight Rider. Alas this supposedly ultra desirable supercar is somewhat of a joke to look at, I think the makers were thinking Bertone (y’know like the Stratos Zero featured in the King of Pop’s ego fest Moonwalker (1988)), but alas it looks more like something I would have drawn as “a car from the year 2010!” as a 10 year old child.

The film follows a predictable but nonetheless entertaining enough path, Quint and Nina join forces and get it on to some smooth jazzy vibes, Quint receives a retribution beating for his earlier indiscretions and the set piece finale sees Quint and the supercar crew taking on Ryland in a low budget skyscraper infiltration that brings to mind certain Nakatomi Plaza adventures that would follow a few years later.

My love of films being set in night time Los Angeles has been well documented previously i’m sure, and as usual this is the primary reason the film still holds fond reminiscence for me. All I need are some slick city street driving scenes and frequent cutaway shots to blue sheen skyscrapers and i’m drooling. This films provides such ‘Mannian’ (is that a term yet? If not, i’m coining it) neo-noir delights aplenty. It’s one of those films you can get on bottom rung DVD company labels in £1 shops, pick it up, it’s a more than competent, fun, throwaway actioner with a tasty mid 80’s vibe and a comedy hot wheels car, go on.

Buffalo '66 - Vincent Gallo - 1998

Warming to the work of Vincent Gallo was something I never expected to find myself succumbing to. My early knowledge of him had been shaped by his self cultivated ‘enfant terrible’ of indie film image, his various rants on the state of cinema, his cameo roles in music video’s such as Glassjaw’s “Cosmopolitan Bloodloss” and his prominent features, a Brando cool overwhelmed by loathing and cynical Lower East Side hipster rat snark.

I was surprised then when I first watched one of his self directed efforts The Brown Bunny (2003) to find a minimal, wistful, malaise led road movie, the only hints of the Gallo i’d been previously privy to, were in the notorious ending featuring his then girlfriend Chloë Sevigny, and so I was led to finally seeing his directorial debut Buffalo 66, and you know what, it’s a good film, in fact on a repeat viewing, it’s actually a pretty great film.

Gallo is Billy, released from prison after 5 years (covering for someone else’s crime because of a large gambling debt); he has somehow convinced his parents that he has been working away on a ‘top secret assignment’ for the last 5 years. Upon arrival in his home town he makes the seemingly extreme decision to kidnap a woman Layla (Christina Ricci) to pose as his wife ‘Wendy’ and complete the delusion of his parents.

The Gallo I saw here on first viewing was the detestable narcissist I had previously envisaged, it was only on a second viewing that this early part of the film began to fit within the scope of the rest of the picture for me. Gallo comes running out of the blocks full of impotent rage. The film after opening with his release from his stretch; spends the next 15 minutes upon his arrival in Buffalo, on a Kafka like futile search for an open toilet facility, an increasingly comical scenario that concludes with an odd homophobic attack/rant. This scene at first just makes us think “typical asshole Gallo” and has been much derided in reviews of the film, but on subsequent viewings I see it more as a release for all the pent up anger, fear and torment that an opening montage showed us that he suffered during his prison term.

Gallo’s hometown of Buffalo is presented as Nowhere U.S.A. A cold post-industrial dystopia, a land of permanent late winter, where the sun never shows from behind the gunmetal cloud cover and a perfectly suitable location for matching the palate of the early 70’s cinema that the fine cinematography recalls, there are echoes of the Boston of Peter Yates’ The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1974) and the eastern seaboard journey of Hal Ashby’s The Last Detail (1973). The city is painted as a landscape of broken dreams and beer stained dollar bills, where the local football team offer the only outlet of passion for the malcontent residents, and it’s this football team (specifically the 1966 Buffalo team of the title and a later incarnation discussed shortly) that prove pivotal in shaping Billy’s livid existence.

We finally meet Billy’s parents, perfectly embodied by Angelica Houston and Ben Gazarra (whose presence makes the viewer no doubt intentionally think of Cassavettes). Dad is a failed crooner, and a short tempered puppy killer, Mom couldn’t care less about Billy’s wellbeing, thinking only of her beloved Buffalo Bills. A well edited scene has Mom state how she wishes she’d never had Billy (due to missing a vital Super Bowl winning game) whilst the commentator of the game playing in the background states “he’ll have to live with that the rest of his life”. This 20 minute centre piece of the film helps us begin to understand Billy’s relentless rage, before meeting his parents, he hilariously makes Layla/Wendy observe his ridiculously specific demands for pleasing them, he clearly craves their approval, he craves for love, but during an increasingly ill tempered meal, the image of his ‘family’ life disintegrates.

We find that Billy’s other motivation for returning to Buffalo, has become a twisted revenge mission on a Scott Woods, the spot kicker who he blames for losing him the bet that left him in hock to the local dons, of course this bet was placed on the Buffalo Bills, the team casting a permanent shadow over his life.

Before he can get around to enacting this revenge though, he and Layla stumble through several downtrodden Buffalo locations together, the bowling alley (in which we receive a wonderful musical interlude courtesy of King Crimson, a shoestring Busby Berkeley number gone prog-rock that somehow fits with the films verisimilitude), a greasy spoon cafe, a 2 dollar photo booth, and finally a makeshift motel room, throughout these scenes Billy continues to rant, rave, demand, all whilst Wendy patiently expresses her love for him, we gradually strip away at the layers of his damage, we find out about his youthful crush on the real Wendy (embodied by Rosanna Arquette as a small town bloodsucker) and his longing to be wanted, finally he breaks, is he truly being offered the love he has never known, could he, Billy Brown actually be loved?

The finale takes us to a showdown with Scott Woods in a strip bar of the gold lamé and swinging tassels variety where Billy must decide between love or annihilation, the scene builds like a low budget Fellini bacchanal, a sweaty grand guignol of gross caricatures.  Billy draws his pistol, his decision is made...

The closing scene proves to be the one that truly won me over, Billy has made his choice and enters a doughnut shop, buzzing with the realisation he has discovered what love feels like, he has a newfound empathy, everyone is his friend, there is a powdered wide eyed rush to his speech, he is imbued with generosity, pure unfiltered happiness, the euphoric joy that comes with knowing you’ve found someone, not just someone, the one! You get me? Everyone deserves a shot at that feeling, even little asshole Billy, he’s in love and we are overwhelmed with happiness for him, what happened? End credits.