The Wild Angels

This film had it all; sex, drugs and rock and roll. This is the trademark of all of Corman's films. Another trademark with this type of film is the fact that he, and other low-budget directors, rely on the children of Hollywood legends (Peter Fonda, Nancy Sinatra) to attract an audience. This is an okay film, and the Peter Bogdanovich's script is pretty decent. The only thing though is that it relied too much on the action to carry the story. Also, the women in this film are mainly used as window dressing. In fact, I don't think Nancy Sinatra had more than ten lines of dialogue in the whole picture. At least Dianne Ladd had more to say. However, the thing I loved the most about the film is the score, which was one of the first examples of what would become heavy metal.

I was 16 years old when I saw this movie and I had just gotten a 90cc Honda motorcycle. What really impressed me was the music in the opening scene where Blue rode his chopper out of Venice, California. I live in LA and was familiar with the area and since I had a bike, I knew the feeling of riding a motorcycle. Each time I ride, I can still hear the music in my head and ever since then I have had a love of pan head, Harley-Davidson choppers. The music played most often and associated with bikes is, "Born to be Wild" from Easy rider. To me, the music is the theme from the Wild Angels. However, even when I saw the movie at that time, I thought the acting was silly. Still, when I think of the movie, I can feel the freedom of the open road, the sound of the exhaust pipes, and the wind in my face. Even at age 53 I still want to go where I want to go and to do what I want to do. This is what America is all about.

'The Wild Angels' was start of AIP's and Roger Corman's counterculture and biker films that itself grew into popular sub-genre in late '60s and early '70s.

Screenplay of 'The Wild Angels' is as empty as it's characters. I have no idea how accurately the film depicts the life of biker gang, but I can imagine that there are quite many boneheads in that subculture. We are introduced to Blues (Peter Fonda) and Loser (Bruce Dern) and their girlfriends Mike (Nancy Sinatra) and Gaysh (Diane Ladd). At first it seems that Blues has more substance than some of his fellow gang members as he stays cool and thoughtful guy at the beginning. He is a criminal like everyone else with no respect towards the law, but his quiet posture gives him somewhat intelligent appearance, but it starts to wear off as the story moves along, until near the end in the funeral scene when the pastor asks him, what it is you want to do? And Blues says (after stuttering), that he wants to be free, to do what we want and all that empty talk. With this immature answer he proves that he has no idea what he wants from life. Add to Fonda's wooden acting and you get a laughable scene with laughable speech that only some (naive) teenagers might find cool. Peter Fonda is terrible, he oozes coolness sitting on his bike and wearing sunglasses but when he opens his mouth that illusion washes away.

Although the screenplay is shallow and acting is passable at best, the direction by Corman is smooth and the pacing is perfect that the film doesn't feel dragging. Smooth bike riding scenes accompanied with cool soundtrack make 'The Wild Angels' one of the best examples of style over substance.

Recommended to everyone who are interested where the biker movie craze started. The direct inspiration to 'Easy Rider'.

I first saw this show in '66 when I was a cycle rider myself. I liked it so much that I went to see it twice. Even liked the music. After watching it again over 30 years later, I have to ask myself just what it was that I found so appealing about the film. It was corny, overacted, sometimes badly acted, and it had a juvenile storyline. I guess what I liked about it back then was all the motorcycles. Good to see that Peter Fonda has improved with age.

Hard to believe that this film went up against The Battle of Algiers at the Venice Film Festival in 1966. Roger Corman is responsible for starting the biker flicks phenomenon with this film.

Peter Fonda is the essence of coo as he performs a role that he made even more popular in Easy Riders three years later.

He is accompanied by Nancy Sinatra as Monkey, Michael J. Pollard as Pigmy, and Bruce Dern as Loser; along with three time Oscar nominee, and Golden Globe and BAFTA winner, Diane Ladd in her first credited movie role.

Radical scene in the church where Fonda debated the preacher (played by Frank Maxwell, Det. Lt. McAllen in one of my favorite films, Mr. Majestyk).

Exciting action, but missing the gratuitous bits featured in other biker films. PG at best.