Wild Riders

Escape machines on the road to hell.

This typically trashy Crown International Pictures release may not be the foulest, single most scuzzy and revolting biker movie ever made (Al Adamson's cartoonishly repellent doozy "Satan's Sadists" gets my vote for that particular dastardly dishonor), but it still rates pretty highly as a real sleazy slice of wonderfully rancid drive-in cinema schlock just the same.

This film starts off promisingly, (for sick, sick thrills) when our two main characters torture and kill Pete's girlfriend because she dared to cheat on him, and with a man who had the gall to be born with a high melanin content, no less. This is too much to stand, even for the rest of the scuzzy biker gang they are riding with, so the gang leader tells them to beat it, hit the road and don't come back, the gang is splitting up and some of us are going to California.

So, the two scuzz buckets, Pete (reminiscent of Peter Fonda's Heavenly Blue, only meaner) and Stick (he's a bit slow but lovable, for a moronic sadist), go off by themselves like some crank-addicted George and Lennie in a white-trash version of "Of Mice and Men". Out of money and desperate, our two anti-heroes take over a somewhat posh suburban home where two sisters are holed up, bickering, since hubby is away on business.

Nice tits!

The face of an idiot.

Idiot riders.

The two creeps take over the house and hold the ladies hostage, and we settle in for over an hour of what appears to be a sort of bargain-basement "Who's Afraid of Virgina Woolf" on meth. Various physical and psychic tortures are inflicted upon both the victims and tormentors, as mind games galore play themselves out, until the inevitable, bloody conclusion. And since this was made during the post-Altamont era, you just know that the ending is most certainly NOT going to consist of the main characters going off into the sunset or sharing milk and cookies. Let's just say you'll never look at the cello the same way again.

Some have stated this film is just a violent creep fest full of ugliness, recriminations and unnecessary cruelty. Perhaps, for that time (1971) the movie does share violent imagery of physical & mental abuse, but believe me, there are movies that would make Wild Riders look like a kindergarten lesson. However, the film was banned in the UK twice. The first time, when it was released in theaters and the second time when it was released in the VHS home format. 

I watched Wild Riders as part of the Millcreek Entertainment 12 DVD movie pack Savage Cinema. The similarities between Arell Blanton's character (Pete) and Peter Fonda's cannot be an accident – it has to be the hair, sideburns, glasses; and, the times. No doubt, Crown International Pictures shot Wild Riders to ride the coattails of Easy Rider, released two years earlier.

Innocent bikini bystanders.

Murder by Cello.

Cello can fight.

True musicians can fight like mad.

However, this movie has more in common with Crown International's Trip with the Teacher (also available from Millcreek Entertainment) than its better-known road trip movie.

Both Crown International films share the same crude production values, sadistic motorcycle goons, and shocking ending.

While Easy Rider is about the trip, we find none of that in Wild Riders, which takes us from a desolate Florida execution of Pete's girlfriend to the Hollywood Hills during the title sequence.

I can sum up the problem here in four words: not enough bike riding. A few more chase scenes, biker parties with naked chicks, or even a shootout with the police, and I might have gotten on board with this little sleaze fest. But, they blew it. I totally get that they had a very low budget to work with, but this wasn't the way to solve that problem. In spite of this, I highlight Alex Rocco's performance as a mildly retarded reprobate. 

Here's the movie trailer: