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The Wild Angels
[MGM Home Entertainment]
1963; color
Directed by Roger Corman
Starring: Peter Fonda, Nancy Sinatra, Bruce Dern & Diane Ladd
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I don't know if there really is a penultimate biker movie but if there, is it's probably The Wild Angels. Truly one of Corman's finest hours as a director; everything comes together in this picture from top to bottom. Fonda, as the curiously named Heavenly Blues (I think it's supposed to be a reference to his eyes), is the leader of the Hell's Angels' San Pedro chapter. (Real members of the San Pedro Hell's Angels are extras, which earns big authenticity points in my book.) His best buddy, Loser (Bruce Dern), along with the rest of the chapter, set out to retrieve Loser's stolen bike. While they're beating up the guys who grabbed it, the man gets wind of the goings on and swoops in to break it up. The Angels scatter but Loser gets separated from the pack and winds up stealing a cop's bike to escape, which leads to him being chased by another cop, shot in the back and hospitalized. Back in Pedro, the Angels find out about Loser's predicament and, knowing that he's going straight to prison once he's recovered, decide to bust him out. Through a fairly clever, though not too well-executed, ruse they manage to spring Loser, only to have him die almost immediately after being brought back to their clubhouse. So what's an Angel do with a buddy's corpse? Give him a proper send off, of course, which is just what they decide to do. The gang pays off an undertaker to prep the body and have it delivered to a church in Loser's hometown, and everybody rides up that night to be there the next morning. The preacher who gets roped in to do the service obviously has no idea what he's in for and winds up being verbally challenged by Blues after mentioning god too much in his eulogy, leading to the great "We wanna be free… free to ride… free to ride our machines without being hassled by the man. And we wanna get loaded…" speech. (Which is not only a defining moment in biker cinema, but it always makes me want to put on Mudhoney's Superfuzz Bigmuff EP whenever I hear it.) Then they kick the preacher's ass, tear up the church and throw an old fashioned party for Loser, propping him up against a wall and sticking a joint in his mouth so he can enjoy the festivities too. Eventually they decide it's time to bury their amigo, which gives us one of Corman's most famous scenes: the biker funeral procession from the church to the cemetery through the Loser's (very small) hometown. As they begin to lower the box into the ground someone beans one of the Angels with a rock and a brawl between the bikers and the locals breaks out. Before any real whuppin' can take place, the all-too-familiar wail of the man's siren can be heard and everyone scatters. Everyone except for Blues that is, who grabs a shovel and starts filling in the grave as the camera pans out and the film ends. This movie has it all - from the excellent shot selection and camera work to the casting (I didn't even mention how great Nancy Sinatra, as Blues' momma Mike, and Diane Ladd, as Loser's woman Gaysh, both are) to Davie Allan's unforgettable "Blues' Theme." (Possibly the greatest musical moment in biker movie history. Fuck "Born To Be Wild," Allan stirs up more grit, grease and grime in four bars than Steppenwolf did in their entire career.) Apparently the Angels felt differently about the finished work though, and sued Corman for $5 million for defamation of character after seeing it in it's completed form. With or without the official endorsement of the Hell's Angels, The Wild Angels is well worth repeat viewings.
—the Kommandant
(Read Bunny's review of Hell's Belles here.)
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