The Bikeriders (2024)

Score: 3 / 5

Jeff Nichols's latest feature is exactly what you'd expect from him, for better and for worse. Your mileage with it will depend on your mileage with its subject matter and aesthetics. Nichols is very much an actor's director, and his films always feature nuanced, grounded performances rooted in time and place (the rural American south or South-adjacent). The potential problem with his films is his storytelling: he usually writes his own screenplays, and while the dialogue is workmanlike, his topics are generally not worthy of much story. His flat plots and forced narratives feel like what would happen if Terence Malick had to take a screenwriting class. Nichols is best at making things look and feel nostalgic and gritty, not at generating actual emotions or carrying them through growth to an outcome.

Case in point: it's really odd that he chooses a woman to be our inlet into this hyper-masculine world of '60s Midwest biker culture. Inspired by Danny Lyon's photography book of the same title, The Bikeriders is essentially a montage of images and ideas ripped from the real-life Outlaws motorcycle club, fictionalized here as the Vandals. And the characters closest to the center of its focus are, in fact, men: Tom Hardy as Johnny and Austin Butler as Benny. They're gruff and tough, chainsmoking and leather-clad, mostly quiet even when fists start to fly. They're also quite mysterious, and as with most of Nichols's films, while his fascination is clearly on American masculinities, he never manages to explore those identities beyond how they look and sound. So it's strange that Jodie Comer's Kathy tells their story for us.

Her account of the Vandals and her life with them is framed by interviews she gives Lyon, played by Mike Faist (who is really making a name for himself lately). She recalls getting dragged into a biker bar by her friend, where her white and lavender habiliments stick out like a Precious Moments doll in a Harley Davidson garage. But she's captivated by one of the smelly, dirty men: Benny, playing pool, younger than most of the other men, and giving his best James Dean. When the camera slows down, it's hard for us not to fall in love too. Or, rather, lust. But it's not wholly carnal lust (though she is married already to an equally uptight man): it's a lust for what he represents. Rebellion, individuality, freedom. Daring to be different and himself. Uptight Kathy is curious enough to pursue it, and she's about to go on the ride of her life. Literally.

A large ensemble cast rounds out the gang, and we get just enough of each of them to make them endearing and idiosyncratic, from an angry Latvian who wanted to go to 'Nam (Michael Shannon) to a habitual bug-eater (Emory Cohen), and including Damon Herriman and Boyd Holbrook as Johnny's backup. Johnny himself is mostly enigmatic, though Kathy tells his story like a fairytale, how he was inspired by Marlon Brando in The Wild One to form the club to, initially, race bikes. His wife and children are mostly absent, indicating again the escapism and freedom Johnny craves among a brotherhood of men doing "what men do." Unfortunately, it doesn't take too long for too many men to become interested, leading to other chapters of the club springing up around the Midwest, drawing the attention and interest of younger, hotheaded delinquents who slowly morph the club into a gang. Issues of criminality plague the Vandals, but Johnny maintains strict order as far as his reach will allow.

Presumably, that's why he takes such a shine to Benny. Hardy and Butler make an electrifying pair on screen, and despite Comer's reliably excellent performance (her accent work alone is worthy of awards), it's the two leading men whose chemistry together makes the film worth watching. Benny's heart of gold leads him to jump into fights without regard for himself, and while Johnny doesn't really approve of the fighting, he recognizes loyalty and bravery and honor when it's so rare in their circles. An excellent opening scene returns later in the film, now with context, and it's a really effective one that features Butler getting brutalized by other men who want him to remove his biker jacket. Obviously the context of the Vandals, how they started and what they became, matter, but the key here is that Benny's grumbled "You'd have to kill me" offers the insight we need to see how deeply entrenched he is in the culture. It has its own language, hierarchy, politics, and rituals, and he's willing to die (and kill) for it. There's even a scene, much later, between Hardy and Butler that frankly had me eager for a kiss, not so much because of what they were saying but because of how they were speaking to each other and listening. It's pretty romantic stuff.

The Bikeriders is, sure, a story of coming of age into a new culture, of assimilation into society and rebellion against another, and of men seeking fulfillment and satisfaction in ways conventionally denied them. But it's also a story of loss. Specifically, the loss of their culture due to inevitable aging and induction of newbies, particularly those with PTSD after the Vietnam war, violent counterculture youths, and the spread of accessible recreational drugs. There's also the hint of Kathy's loss: her married life with Benny is almost nonexistent in the film, begging the question of whether she knew what she was signing up for and exactly how she feels about the club and its climate. Sure, she begs Benny to be safe and not to be recklessly violent, but it doesn't seem like she has any idea what he and his buddies really get up to. And their intimacy becomes about as flaccid as you wouldn't expect.

Which is true of the film in general. Excellent production design, an evocative soundtrack, and gorgeous cinematography -- and, of course, the fabulous acting -- make it lovely to behold, but the lack of earned emotional depth makes it all feel a little quaint and wistful. Like a photobook on a coffee table, The Bikeriders holds your attention only if you care to look, and even then there's little to hook your brain or heart. It's an empty daydream, one musing its loss of self, and at every moment that could eke out profound insight or truisms or even relevance to today, it chooses to remain silent and wallow in its own surly mystique.