Easy Rider

Easy Rider – 1969, Dennis Hopper

There are lots of films out there that are full of social commentary, and a lot of them put their message across in a more subtle and coherent manner than Easy Rider, but there are a couple of reasons why few ‘relevant’ films can hold a candle to Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda’s finest hour (and a half).

When they set out to make a movie about the hippie movement and its place in America, they had an idea of the message they wanted to get across, but they didn’t have a screenplay when they started shooting. They didn’t even have a cast, a lot of the rednecks are played by actual rednecks encountered while shooting in Louisiana. The production started in New Orleans without so much as a script, but they did have a big bag of drugs (legend has it that all the marijuana use in the film is genuine).

Eventually Hopper and Fonda got their act together and the film came together. Given the experimental nature of the film and the road trip approach to the shoot, it is perhaps both remarkable and unsurprising that the film was so ground breaking and culturally significant. Although it should be noted that Hopper spent a year editing the film, and his cut was three hours long (which I think would have been unbearable), Donn Cambern put together the film that was released, so he is due as much credit as Hopper.


The combination of a chaotic yet inspired shoot and an excellent editor produced a film that perfectly reflected the end of the hippie movement in America; the hippie communes failed, the love-ins spawned jealousy and The South remained intolerant.
Easy Rider more than achieved its goal of helping a nation understand what they had just experienced (and lost) in the 60s, and as a bonus, left behind a legacy of screen iconography.

Lots of films fall over themselves in an attempt to say something about society. Easy Rider proves that the best intentions are not necessarily enough when making a film with a message and a purpose. It takes the right combination of time and place (and drugs).

Easy Rider: The Classic that doesn’t disappoint.