I didn't expect to like Easy Rider (1969). I'm not sure why. Maybe it, like MASH, represents a shift in film making toward intentionally meaningful movies. Not that previous movies weren't meaningful (with intent), but the meaning often seemed to come out of the material whose first goal was to entertain. If you think about books, there are ones that tell a great story but also make you think, and there are non-fiction that set out to make you think, and finally there are fiction that set out to make you think under the guise of a story. As Mark says in the wonderful Edward Eager children's book Half Magic, "it's being made to learn things not on purpose".

I suppose this is a subjective appraisal of movies, and quite probably untrue and unfair. Maybe it has more to do with the films getting closer to what I remember as a kid. Or is it...? I was five when Easy Rider came out. It wouldn't influence me directly. But it would influence my parents, and the world around me, and also the kinds of movies and television I'd see years later. As I move through the sixties and into the seventies, I get uncomfortably closer to myself.

Is it a compliment to Easy Rider that I felt compelled to write the above paragraphs, to be self-reflective? I think so. It's an excellent film, mostly filmed in standard ways, but with appropriate use of a couple of unusual techniques, especially directory (and star) Dennis Hopper's unnerving scene transitions, mocking the simple dissolve.

Like Rebel Without a Cause, in which Hopper had a small role, Easy Rider focuses on the outcast minority. Like many movies that hit me close to home, it shows that people who are "normal" are often deathly afraid of those who are "different". The outsiders may be peaceful, just trying to enjoy life their own way. That is, they're not hurting anyone just because of their differences, anymore than someone who is left handed (or black, or gay) hurts others just because of their differences. It's the others who perceive a threat to their own idea of how life is supposed to be. If they accept these people--who are "wrong"--then their own survival is at stake. And that's why people who claim moral and social normalcy will be cruel, persecute, imprison, kill, etc.

Easy Rider is also, like many other of the films I've most enjoyed from the AFI Top 100, a clear period piece that captures memories of how people and places looked. It isn't an artist's conception (though it isn't a documentary), but is how it was. Have you ever listened to the soundtrack to the musical Hair? There are two versions. One is from the original 60s Broadway cast, the other from the 1979 film. No offense to the fine actors and director of the film, but comparing the two recordings is like seeing the Mona Lisa, and seeing a caricature of the Mona Lisa. The original recording sounds authentic because it was authentic.

In any case...watch Easy Rider.

Dennis Hopper, almost unrecognizable.

The dreamer of the film, Peter Fonda

Modern movie cameras and films don't allow sun flares to occur anymore. (In fact, when Joss Whedon created the series Firefly, he wanted this effect and the cinematographer had to search for a camera that would produce it.)

Hopper could as easily have been directing a western. This is one of many lovely shots. The other fellow on the bike with Fonda is Luke Askew

Jack Nicholson, in a relatively small--but crucial--role.

Here's a fun little puzzle/question that I first saw on the wonderful series NUMB3RS, but was actually posed to a famous columnist.

Suppose you're on a game show, and you're given the choice of three doors.
Behind one door is a car, behind the others, goats.

You pick a door, say #1, and the host, who knows what's behind the doors, opens another door, say #3, which has a goat. He says to you, "Do you want to pick door #2?"

Is it to your advantage to switch your choice of doors?

I'll provide a link to the full answer, and my even plainer language explanation, in the next couple of days.

This is a valuable enough article that I'm reprinting it without permission. Hopefully the NYT won't mind.

New York Times
December 5, 2006

For Couples, Reaction to Good News Matters More Than Reaction to Bad
By BENEDICT CAREY

Scientists who study relationships have long focused on how couples handle love�s headaches, the cold silences and searing blowups, the childcare crises and work stress, the fallouts over money and ex-lovers.

But the way that partners respond to each other�s triumphs may be even more important for the health of a relationship, suggests a paper appearing in the current issue of The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. The study found that the way a person responds to a partner�s good fortune � with excitement or passive approval, shared pride or indifference � is the most crucial factor in tightening a couple�s bond, or undermining it.

�When something good happens to your partner, it�s a terrific opportunity to strengthen the relationship � that�s what this study really says,� said Art Aron, a social psychologist at Stony Brook University in New York, who was not part of the study. �It fits with this whole thrust in the field, focusing on how to make things better rather than trying to avoid making them worse.�

In the study, researchers asked 79 heterosexual couples who had dated at least six months to fill out questionnaires characterizing how their partners typically reacted to positive news. People often had different styles in different contexts: a boyfriend who withdrew when his partner was upset or overwhelmed might glow with shared excitement if she was promoted. The researchers filmed the couples interacting in the lab, as they discussed positive events that happened to one or the other, to check their self-reports. The researchers also had members of the pairs rate how satisfied they were in the relationship, based on a battery of questions at the start of the study and again two months later.

The study was conducted by Shelly Gable, a psychologist at the University of California, Los Angeles; Gian Gonzaga, a psychologist formerly at U.C.L.A., and Amy Strachman, a graduate student there.

In the laboratory as in life, constructive support is generally better for a relationship than detachment, as many people have learned the hard way. Couples who lace their arguments with sarcasm and mean jabs, studies find, are usually headed for a split. But in their analysis of response styles, the researchers found that it was the partners� reactions to their loved ones� victories, small and large, that most strongly predicted the strength of the relationships. Four of the couples had broken up after two months, and the women in these pairs rated their partners� usual response to good news as particularly uninspiring.

Celebrating a partner�s promotion as if it were one�s own provides the partner with a tremendous emotional lift, said Dr. Gable, while playing down or belittling the news can leave a deep and lasting chill.

In most relationships, positive events outnumber negative ones by at least four to one, studies have found, and �you get much more bang for your buck� by amplifying life�s rewards than by soothing its bruises, as important as that is, Dr. Gable said.

�When you�re seeking support from a partner, there�s a lot more going on than when you�re sharing good news,� she added. �Your ego is on the line. You�re admitting that maybe you can�t handle this by yourself. And the best your partner can do is relieve your distress. It�s not the most scientific thing I can say, but for the partner it�s also a bummer to have deal with it, too.�