The Hard Ride

One of the few motorcycle themed films that tried for something different than the usual approach, and largely failed because of it. Most of these biker gang films were action films with an occasional dose of romance (or more likely, pure lust), to fill the time between scenes of rumbles or long rides across the California desert. This is really a romantic drama with occasional action scenes to break up the emoting. Clearly, this is the wrong approach to take in a motorcycle film, "Easy Rider" aside.

Robert Fuller (of "Emergency" and many other roles) is a Vietnam vet who returns home. His buddy Lenny has left him his totally tricked out cycle and he is supposed to take charge of it and bring his "friend" Big Red to Lenny's funeral. Fuller hooks up with Lenny's ex-squeeze Cheryl, and goes in search of Big Red. He also runs afoul of a local bike gang and a few pill popping punks in a beat-up hot rod (some kind of super obscure car that I could not recognize...I think it was a foreign number, possibly a Hillman). Plenty of time is spent on long romantic rides and deep philosophical discussions...all to the detriment of the viewer.

If you're making a motorcycle gang film, you've got to let the sleaze come to the fore. Sure, there were some fights, conflicts, tension, and menacing, dirty, unshaven bikers on view here. So I can't rate this film TOO low. But, overall, I'd have to say: guys, nice try, but, it didn't work out how you hoped it would. Some people may like the change of pace here, but for me, I felt somewhat disappointed.

For a "B" film, it is not too bad. Controversial for its time with themes of interracial love, illegal drug use, free love, liberated women and Viet Nam. Some decent music and a surprise ending in a relatively "tame" biker flick, make it entertaining enough if you like Robert Fuller.

While the two leads here are adequate for this type of bottom-of-the-bill movie, one has to admit that this is the kind of film one would find at a drive-in in 1971 -- a drive-in occupied entirely by couples far too busy making out in their back seats to ever glance at the screen or even hook the speaker to their car windows. It's hard to figure what's worse here -- the lousy script and direction, idiotic soundtrack music, the cheapo production techniques, the poor editing, the badly choreographed fight scenes ("heightened" by inexplicable slo-mo) or the stupidly clichéd plot and characters. The motorcycle sequences are almost laughable. The childish dopes the movie tries to typify would have been just as awesome on bicycles with training wheels. What an embarrassing waste of film.

If you're looking for something a little different from the typical late '60s/early '70s AIP biker flick, then ignore any negatory comments about this film and track yourself down a copy. (As of April 2006 Sony/MGM has yet to release it onto DVD; it was only available about 10 years back on VHS from the now-defunct Orion, who then had the rights to the AIP library, which MGM then subsequently picked up.) Yes, this film is not so heavy on the exploitation elements as others of the genre (e.g. "Satan's Sadists", which I found to be abysmally dull and typical of the inept hackwork of the 'great' Al Adamson - the title's the best thing about that film). Not that it's lacking in violence, sex, drugs and general sleaziness (there's even some brief topless nudity); it's just that this film also has some other things on its mind - LIKE TELLING A STORY.

Gravelly-voiced Robert Fuller (soon-to-be of 'Emergency!' fame) stars as a returning Vietnam vet who, in accordance with a dying buddy's wishes, takes under his care his dead friend's chopper, named 'Baby'. And what a hog! This is the kind of motorcycle that I used to fantasize about when I was six years old, with high handlebars, big pipes, long forks and a throaty engine. VRROOOOM! Fuller also hooks up (not in the literal sense, mind you - at least, not initially) with his dead pal's old lady, one Sheryl, played by genre vet Sherry Bain, who is far more plausibly cast in the role than, say, Jocelyn Lane in "Hell's Belles". (Don't get me wrong: I LOVE Jocelyn Lane - she is an uber-fox of the highest degree, but she is nowhere near as believable as a 'motorcycle mama' as Bain is.) Ms. Bain, with her tousled mane of real red hair and curvy but not over-endowed body, is beautiful, but not TOO beautiful for the role, with hints of wear and tear, some frazzled edges, but still radiating a healthy sexiness, albeit one with more than a hint of sadness and cynicism underlying it.

The film also deals with some interesting racial angles, too, that - to my knowledge, anyway - were pretty atypical for a genre picture like this one, and deals with them in an interesting fashion, if perhaps a tad bit too cursorily. For example, Fuller's dead pal was black, and thus Sheryl, a white woman, was crossing the color line in her relationship with him. Later, encountering another black biker who makes an impertinent assumption in coming onto her, she is prompted to respond, "I wasn't into him because he was black!" Also, the film's MacGuffin (of a sort - he's the guy Fuller and Bain spend most of the running time looking for), a guy who goes by the sobriquet Big Red, is a Native American (tribe not specified) - just another interesting detail in film whose genre is all too often portrayed as being as lily white as many eastern prep schools.

As for the exploitation angles, like I said, there's plenty of substance abuse, some skinnydipping, a scene in a whorehouse (with the aforementioned nudity - hey, you could get away with more in the early '70s with a 'GP' rating) and some fairly brutal and well-directed fight sequences (much better than just about any from other films in this genre and period). Plus lots and lotsa hogs.

The Hard Ride tries to be a message movie, as Robert Fuller (soon to be Dr Kelly Brackett on TV's 'Emergency!') comes home from 'Nam to reclaim his dead buddy's chopper, Baby. Complications ensue as the local chapter of Hell's Bellyachers don't take too kindly to a straight dude muscling in on the action. This is no Satan's Sadists, heck it's not even Hell's Angel on Wheels, so aside from a few chase scenes and a whiff of miscegenation there's not much fun to be had here.