Cyclists: too light rider

Ahead of the 2023 Cannes Film Festival, the world of movie buffs isn’t paying much attention: the official competition selection is “Bike Racers,” the new film from Jeff Nichols (Find shelter, Dirt, Midnight Special), the greatest experience of American cinema, the owner of a particularly attractive distribution, a compiler of the most sought-after actors of the moment (Jodie Comer, Austin Butler, Tom Hardy, Mike Feist, Michael Shannon). The rumors disappeared on the eve of the official announcement of the 2023 elections by Thierry Fremaux. The film does not live up to the retrospective of Venice 2023 and Berlin 2024. Cyclists Finally, after this long-standing, disappointing: cult photographer Danny Lyon’s adaptation of the Midsummer Night’s Motard Club, Nichols’ film confronts the times of the legend in the swoon of lost illusions, resulting in a magnum opus of restoring the era.

In a city bar, Katie, a young woman with an energetic temperament, Croise Benny, who has joined a gang of motorcycle vandals, and tombe aussitôt sous soncharme. À l’image du pas tout entier, le Gang, Dirigé par l’énigmatique Johnny, évolue Peu à Peu… Alors que les motards Accueillaient Tous ceux qui avaient du Mal à Trouver leur Place dans la Société, les Vandals deviennent une Bande de Voious without Vergon. Benny chose Katie and her loyal friends in this gang.

Adapting the cultural heritage of photographer Danny Lyon in the motard club of old, Nichols’s film confronts the times of the legend of bygone illusions, being a remarkable work in restoring an era.

Jeff Nichols, by origin, is a South American filmmaker and an excellent storyteller of the American (l’Amérique profonde) déclassé and marginalized populations, called David Gordon Green, an old fellowship in the study, in the worthy legacy of Terrence Malick, plus terrienne and the countryside. These three premiere films (from Shotgun Stories To Dirt) to go around this area, where there are these themes, design, as the main discovery of American cinema in these last years, with the possible Ari Aster. This is a cinéma est avantage ensuite rentré dans la Norme: a fantastic sci-fi film in the style of Spielberg (Midnight Special), a humanistic melodrama about interracial couples (Love). In the bathroom he appeared later, with love for Jeff Nichols to redo his new, cinematic conversations.

Ce qui frappe d’emblée dans Cyclists, this is a recovery application. Jeff Nichols is inspired by his main source, Danny Lyon’s work of the same name, reproducing parfois à la pose in front of photographs of motards, as well as the fact that the films are the cult cinematic authors of motards (L’Equipée Sauvage, easy ridervoice Scorpio Rising Kenneth Anger). Narration and stylistics, Nichols, after visiting the place under the mentorship of Malick (all three film premieres), Spielberg (Midnight Special). paid tribute to none other than Martin Scorsese in particular Le Affranchyan example of the Scorsesian model, also relevant Mean Streets, casino, Le Lou de Wall Streetet don’t il est facile d’enumérer les caractéristiques maintes fois reprises par des suiveurs: voix off d’un of the protagonist of history, narration in memoirs, saturation strip of the pipes of the era.

The originality of the film lies in the fact that it is from the point of view of the female character Katie (Jodie Comer, the heroine Killing Eve, absolutely bluffante, jouant d’un accent à couper au couteau), seule femme quasiment dans un monde exceptionally masculine, celui des motards. This allows Nichols to modernize the point of view, creating a simple homage to virilistic or masculinist behavior that can be passed on. Another surprise of the film, which has now been replaced by the usual love triangle style Jules and Jimtwo friends looking for a girl, another original triangle, or Katie and Johnny (Tom Hardy) vying for the attention of Benny (Austin Butler).

“La or Jeff Nichols simply touches on this opposition between the utopian times of legend and the hazy return to reality, which means a parallel between the two sides of the film.” The kingdom of the bikers ended with the problem of the hippies, who became the crowd of a new generation, with a different way of thinking, moins soudés entre eux, plus opportunists and violent people (cf. la preaggression). Katy-style sexy group is a miracle). Nichols continues his exploration of deep America, the myths and legends that may be the constitution. However, perhaps I regret that hormis les quelques signalés, Cyclists n’apporte Rien de Réellement neuf neither for understanding the history of Etats-Unis nor for Nichols’s filmography. He pays tribute to the new master guardian, but most of all he is engaged in creativity that opens up new perspectives. He had hoped that Nichols had cleared up the dilemma, but best of all, sometime last year.

RÉALISATEUR : Jeff Nichols 
NATIONALITÉ :  américaine 
GENRE : drame, chronique
AVEC : Jodie Comer, Austin Butler, Tom Hardy, Mike Faist, Michael Shannon 
DURÉE : 1h56 
DISTRIBUTEUR : Universal Pictures International France 
SORTIE LE 19 juin 2024