Still images have been a source of wonder and mythology in Jeff Nichols’ films.
Nichols’ Twain-soaked Mississippi tale “Mud” seems drawn from a magical scene of a boat held aloft by a tree. “Loving,” about a ’60s interracial marriage, drew inspiration from tender Life magazine photographs taken of the real-life couple. Nichols’ latest, “The Bikeriders,” is based on photographer Danny Lyon’s 1968 book of the same name, for which he spent four years with a Chicago motorcycle club.
It’s not hard to see what Nichols saw in Lyon’s black-and-white photographs. It has the stylish raw materials — the chrome bikes, the pulled-back hair, the black leather jackets. But it also has an emerging anti-authoritarian, smooth-riding spirit and camaraderie. Like the central characters in “Loving,” they are classically drawn outsiders who encapsulate something glorious and uneasy about freedom in America.
In the thrilling first half of “The Bikeriders,” which arrives in theaters Friday, Nichols needs to summon a heady atmosphere reminiscent of those old pictures rather than build a narrative around his bike gang, the Vandals. “The Bikeriders” eventually bogs down with heavy plot mechanics — you can almost feel his riders growing weary of strapping narrative devices to their bikes. The movie wants to ride, but it’s not sure how much story to pack into the ride. But it’s a vivid dramatization of the birth of an American subculture.
The framing device that Nichols has chosen is Leon, a character played by Mike Faist himself, conducting interviews for his book. His conversations with a woman named Kathy narrate the film intermittently and sporadically until the end.
Kathy, who is based on a real person, seems at first glance an unlikely spokesperson for the gang. She speaks in a thick Illinois accent and has no affinity for motorcycle riders. But one night at the bar, she sees Benny across the smoky room and, even though she doesn’t admit it at the moment, falls in love with him. Again, it’s not hard to see why. Butler has by now moved a long way from Elvis Presley, but the flexibility with which he can immerse himself in mid-century America is no less evident. Benny drives Kathy home, parks his bike outside the place and waits patiently for her boyfriend to leave town.
Nichols, a devotee of films like “Hud” and “Cool Hand Luke,” is a filmmaker who works very consciously within the classic American idiom. He has James Dean in The Butler, which makes Tom Hardy his Marlon Brando. Hardy plays Johnny, Benny’s best friend who starts and heads up the Vandals.
The Vandals, as a club, start out as simply as kids might call a tree house to order. They’re a group of guys who like to ride motorcycles and talk about them. That’s it. But men flock like moths to a flame, attracted to the tough lifestyle, the cool patched jackets and the way they stand out from mainstream America. They include Cal, Cockroach, Funny Sonny and Zipco.
Someone proudly says, “Pornography and motorcycles go together.”
It seems like the early days of this group must have been a lot of fun. Barroom fights and carefree strolls through cornfields. Most of these guys don’t have much, but they have each other. And their loyalty is absolute.
Kathy isn’t so sure. She looks at the growing gang – an all-male group – with suspicion and fear for Benny. Sometimes, they fight just for fun. They are the real Fight Cubs.
But soon, Kathy isn’t the only one who doubts what they’ve created. As their gang grows, Johnny and Benny have even less of a grasp on what the Vandals represent. Some of the new members are straight back from Vietnam. Their old exploits escalate into more serious crimes. In one terrifying scene, Kathy finds herself nearly attacked by its members. The gang – and its pretense of toughness – begins to seem like a trap, even to its leader. Benny has to choose between the Vandals and Kathy. The implications of homosexuality are underplayed but not ignored; when Benny and Johnny discuss their future, they do so slowly and intimately, in the dark, like a secret confession.
As the Vandals’ core ideals disintegrate, it might feel like “The Bikeriders” locks into a familiar “Goodfellas”-like structure, but with a significant shift in narrator for a drama that’s ultimately about masculinity. This is a movie that’s straddling a lot of contradictory ambitions. It wants to be authentic but it wants to tell a grand American saga. It wants mythology as well as naturalism. It’s those instincts that have made Nichols one of the most essential filmmakers of his generation, even if the results have sometimes been a bit underwhelming. Even his best, most firmly rooted films try to strike a balance that can be elusive.
But I think it’s these dual inspirations — and, again, all the fabulous jackets — that make “The Bikeriders” work. The movie is unabashedly romantic about the Vandals, but it’s equally dubious about the rugged masculinity they represent. “The Bikeriders” has its hand firmly on the throttle as well as on the brakes.
“The Bikeriders,” a Focus Features release, is rated R by the Motion Picture Association for language, violence, some drug use and brief sensuality. Duration: 116 minutes. Three stars out of four.
Follow film writer Jake Coyle: http://x.com/jakecoyle
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