This film screened 14th & 15th February 2010.

Re-released in a new 35mm print that does justice to its outstanding visuals and inspired soundtrack, Dennis Hopper’s Easy Rider(1969) became famous as one of those film industry milestones that could be treated (praised then, condemned later) as a statement of the Zeitgeist, of two drug-dealing bikers ‘going to look for America’ and finding only moral waste and redneck repression. With its soundtrack composed of Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, Robbie Robertson, Carole King and others, and its fairly constant pot-smoking, Easy Riderbecame the pop event of its time, its despair and alienation from America merely a predictable reflex gesture. In fact, simple though it might be, its message about the American Dream that had lost its way is both sharply pointed and, literally and metaphorically, takes in a lot of ground. It also has a clarity and resonance that its reputation may not lead one to expect.