(According to Bicycling.com anyway.....) 1. Pee-wee's Big Adventure The greatest movie ever made about cycling is the wildly creative, idiosyncratic masterpiece Pee-wee's Big Adventure. Stop rolling your eyes.
The movie, which turns 25 in 2010, is a polarizing cinematic curiosity. People love it or loathe it, mostly because of writer/actor Paul Reubens's deeply eccentric—or creepy, depending on how you see it—performance as a bow-tie-wearing man-boy who talks in a kiddie voice, utters inane phrases like "I know you are, but what am I?" and dances in white platform shoes to "Tequila." The central plot device of PWBA is the traumatic theft of Pee-wee's prized bike: a customized, cherry-red vintage Schwinn with handlebar tassels, rearview mirrors, metal panniers and an enormous lion's face atop the head tube. It gets ripped off early in the film—while Pee-wee is visiting his local bike shop, no less—and the remainder of PWBA is a raucous, Bob Hope-style road movie in which the juvenile protagonist fends off an escaped prisoner, an outlaw motorcycle gang and a eyeball-popping ghost truck driver named Large Marge as he tries to find his cherished ride, which, thanks to a shady psychic—an homage to The Bicycle Thief—he believes is stashed in the basement of the Alamo. 2. Breaking Away Working-class kids, restless in a college town, try to…we really don’t have to walk you through this one. All you need to know is that’s not just one of the best cycling films ever made, but one of the best films period. It won the 1980 Academy Award for Best Screenplay and was nominated for four other awards. 3.The Triplets of Belleville People before they see Triplets for the first time: “Am I really about to watch an animated French film?” Same people at end: “…” (They’re speechless.) This story of a determined grandmother trying to rescue her cyclist grandson after his kidnapping at the Tour de France—and really, that’s just the half of it—is an almost wordless, thoroughly unforgettable adventure. And a stunning homage to Fausto Coppi. 4.American Flyers Pre-Bull Durham Kevin Costner in a mustache is one thing, but Rae-Dawn Chong’s wheel change is the real stunner in this fun story of two brothers who tackle the Hell of the West through the Rockies. Some of the details are ludicrous—the way the Russian pros bob and weave as they attack—but as celebration of the 1980s American cycling scene, with appearances by the 7-Eleven Team and the gone-but-missed Coors Classic, it’s worth your time. 5.The Bicycle Thief The unflinching tale of a poor father and son searching for the father’s stolen ride—a bike he needs to get a job—is a bleak but truthful story of survival. It’s also a rebuke to Hollywood slickness. It ushered in a new era of cinematic realism and is routinely listed as one of the greatest films of all time. Don’t let the subtitles scare you off. 6.A Sunday in Hell If you’ve ever struggled to explain the consuming passion of bike racing to civilians, refer them to this film instead. A chronicle of the 1976 Paris-Roubaix race—with riders like Eddy Merckx, Roger De Vlaeminck and Francesco Moser—it’s a transporting documentary that drops you into the cobblestone dust, soaks you in sweat and fetishizes the suffering of the world’s greatest one-day race. 7. Stars & Watercarriers Another documentary by Jorgen Leth (director of A Sunday in Hell), this one follows the 1973 Giro d’Italia, but it’s not a story about the race—there are few clues to the general classification, time differentials, stage winners or other facts. Instead, you get unforgettable images of Eddy Merckx, such as when he lets a hometown racer go off the front for a moment of glory then ferociously chases and passes him with a look that would give Lance Armstrong nightmares. And you get the watercarriers, the workers, whose images are perhaps more inspiring than Merckx’s—not to mention the somehow magic scene of glass bottles of water being opened with church keys and passed around the pack during the race. 8. 2 Seconds After a moment of weakness in the start gate—the titular two seconds—a female downhill mountain biker is kicked off her team and, in a life crisis, becomes a bike messenger. Her job puts her in contact with a guru-like Italian bike shop-owner who helps her understand and appreciate the culture of road-bike racing. This Canadian film (in French, with English subtitles) is nearly too light and corny to leave an impact, but somehow gets the feeling of wanting to be a bike racer just right. It’s best when discovered without hype, so pretend we didn’t like it much and you just stumbled across it on your own. 9.Key Exchange Daniel Stern—Breaking Away’s Cyril—returns in another cycling-related role in this movie adaptation of a successful off-Broadway play about the foibles and farces of relationships 1980s New York City. It’s fluffy, illogical and has cycling scenes of questionable verisimilitude. Yet there is something powerful about the naïve yearning of the two main male lead characters—Stern and Ben Masters—to be in the Tour de France that strikes the heart of committed cyclists. Even through the ’80s hairdos and wardrobes. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "DarkAndDirty" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/darkanddirty?hl=en.
