The Wild Angels (Roger Corman)

This is a film that relies on its sheer coolness to work. It’s the kind of movie that makes you want to run out and buy a leather jacket, a Steppenwolf “Best of...” record, and a 1966 Heritage Softail Harley Davidson. The ultimate in Punk Rock cinema, making you want to ‘cause a riot act around the neighborhood for no good reason. The dialogue for the first hour is flat, not too deep in narrative, with almost no inciting incidents other than the obvious: biker gang gets in trouble with the law, what happens next? In fact, I find it hard to fall in love with the characters, or find them engrossing in any way, until the last bit: the Funeral/Party scene.

The Scene-

We begin with a montage- cut and pasting a swastika flag covered coffin against the loud blaring exhaust off Peter Fonda’s chopper, as he and Nancy are riding to the funeral. “Here comes the blues...” - They enter, the music stops, this is where the real movie begins. This is where Fonda’s character- “Blue”, goes mano-a-mano with the lord, religion, everything the Angels stood against, an unexpected debate between God and biker. “Tell me, just what is it you want to do?” - Preacher. “We wanna be free.. and we wanna get loaded!” - Blue. Most movies gradually pull you in more, naturally increase in energy, feel its way to the climax. Roger Corman tends to give you little jolts of something bigger to come, making you wait for something/anything extraordinary to happen over and over again throughout the movie in full. In this case, the climax, being the funeral/party scene, blows up in your face with philosophical surprise, unlike the typical Hollywood biker movie. The angels trash the church, tie up the preacher, the movie proceeds to an ingenious use of musical master-scoring underneath a shaky, nervous edged camera revolving around the room amongst the laughter and confusion, not only are you at the party, but you’re suddenly the uninvited camera man who can’t leave! There’s an out of time conga solo, morphed into a 60’s garage rock band, rocking out the 12 bar blues. In focus, there are three dominant musical forces playing simultaneously during this scene: The conga solo, some generic B movie doo wop tune, and a Nico-esque haunting female voice fading in/out. If the Velvet Underground were to score a Roger Corman movie, this is what it would be like. Each takes a turn in volume, in no particular order or sequence to what’s going on screen. As Diane Ladd awakens after being raped, the music drops out, leaving an innocent little girl’s voice, humming a melancholy nursery rhyme sort of thing. Even the tone pitch is modulating, to really give you the feeling of LSD hysteria, rape sociopath subconscious. Just to add to confusion, what sounds like, a broken harmonica plays the out of tune blues, as she stumbles her way to “Loser” (Bruce Dern), who’s planted at the side of the room, dead, fixed positioned, stone cold to the nervous breakdown Ladd plays out.

There’s always an audience for the open minded, the- “what’s not been done before” club. Not since “The Wild Angels”, has a director portrayed chaos so erratically. I actually get nauseous, watching this scene. It resolves to a twangy tremelo guitar, as they’re about to bury “Loser”. The movie calms down, and quick to surprise, a kid throws a rock at an angel, starting another riot. “Blue” stays while his forbidden army escapes the police, finally realizing there’s no end to the Angel’s ongoing cycle of uncontrollable madness. “There’s nowhere to go.”- he says, left alone to be captured. For a movie that starts off very stylistic, and devoid of real emotional plot, you’re left wondering what happens to “Blue”. The best movies do that, leave you wondering about the characters after the movie is over. I feel like Corman really wanted to wow you in the end, or maybe he just became a better filmmaker as the movie goes on. What starts as a bad drug flick, anti-establishment commercial, becomes a passionate growing of age movie, about a troubled lost soul, coming to terms with his long lived apathy, and perhaps, accepts he has a choice in his future. “Blue” lifts a shovel to bury his friend, symbolically burying his past along with him.