lor_ I saw this film in the 1970s at a Cleveland Drive-in, then titled "Naked under Leather", and enjoyed it as a peculiarly big-name (stars in the cast) exploitation film. I later have realized it was perhaps the first of its kind and influential.Of course, it is compared to Easy Rider, though predating that hit by a year. The use of the road movie format to present an existentialist story was later to reach its apotheosis in 1971 with Monte Hellman's "Two-Lane Blacktop" and Richard C. Sarafian's major cult classic "Vanishing Point", the last-named becoming my favorite film of the time. I even bought a Dodge Challenger and enjoyed watching "VP" and other similar movies at the drive-in sitting in my favorite car.This Jack Cardiff original is being revived at the New York Public Library upon the suggestion of staff from Film Comment magazine, so it's due to be taken seriously. My problems with the film are worth this short review.Similar works by French authors were quite popular at the time, my choice being Sebastian Japrisot's "The Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun", a strange work that was filmed twice, the first one being vastly underrated: Jean Negulesco's glossy movie starring Samantha Eggar and Oliver Reed.Cardiff adapted the screenplay and rather adventurously presents the story almost exclusively in voice-over from the heroine's point-of-view: much of the action is mere fantasy on her part. Mick Jagger's girlfriend at the time, singer Marianne Faithfull, stars, and the movie unfolds almost as a love letter to her - endless closeups and enough smiles for her to audition for The Sound of Music.The director in his commentary emphasizes the participation of Alain Delon as her co-star: a subordinate role but crucial as he was the top leading man in Europe for the 1960s. But Cardiff is off-base in his self-praise for the frequent use of positive/negative post-production alteration of the visuals, that create a "psychedelic" effect intended to fend off the censors. The technique is crude and ineffective. Similarly, his yeoman work to disguise the fact that Faithfull cannot ride a bike, let alone a magnificent Harley at high speeds, goes for naught -most of the footage looks fake or clearly second unit (with a stunt guy doubling for the beauty).But as an experiment its power continues, even to the extent of the Tom Hardy one-man-show "Locke", which I thought was imitating "Vanishing Point" with its protagonist behind the wheel for an hour and a half, but owes more to Cardiff's single-minded creation.And the sex that earned the movie an X-rating (though at a time when X rated movies included "Midnight Cowboy") is more of the fetish kind. You know, the British kink for rubber and leather and such, best epitomized in the '60s by Diana Rigg's fabulous fetish outfits in the hit TV series "The Avengers".We get to see tasteful nude shots of Marianne, which now should prove amusing to her fan base as she morphed from Jagger's ""As Tear Go By" to a fine, mature folk singer over the years, and an emphasis on her leather costume that puts to shame the thousands of ridiculous bondage/fetish videos that clutter up this IMDb database (search for odd-ball names under the Genre "Adventure" and you'll find them.

zivafemme I'm not sure what to think about Girl on a motorcycle. It wasn't... great and it wasn't intellectual. I kind of want my time back. Marianne Faithful wasn't terrible, but her "Wheee! I'm free on my biiike!" were over the top. Now that I've seen it, I see where a lot of actors get their inspiration when they spoof being incredibly attractive bastards. Hellooo, Delon. The premise is interesting - marrying for security, marrying to give you a reason to rebel, chasing the absolute worst person for you as punishment for whatever you think you need to be punished for, or to punish others. I felt this version was self-serving and indulgent on the part of the director.

Woodyanders Oh yeah, baby! Now this film may not be good in a conventional sense of the word, but man is it one hopelessly dated, yet charming and unintentionally amusing slice of swingin' 60's camp silliness. Rock singer/songwriter, former smack addict, and onetime Mick Jagger main squeeze Marianne Faithful portrays Rebecca, a bored housewife who bails on her drab, stuffed shirt hubby, dons a spectacular skintight leather jumpsuit, hops on a shiny, powerful custom chopper, and drives halfway across Europe to reunite herself with her absolute to die for stud muffin college professor lover Daniel (the ever-cool Alain Delon). This marvelously messed-up and ridiculous misfire boasts clumsy direction by Jack Cardiff (who also did the often stunning garish cinematography), a groovy score by Les Reed, the gorgeous Marianne looking positively smashing both in and out of her clothes, plenty of funky oh-so-60's psychedelic visuals (I especially loved the brilliant ruddy whirlpool with the silhouetted seagulls flying around it), a startling bummer of a surprise downbeat ending, and, best of all, Marianne articulating via voice-over all these incredibly dippy heavy sentiments on such worldly topics as war, tying the knot ("Marriage is a little death"), love, obsession, and, naturally, the galvanizing, liberating feel of a mean machine throbbin' between your legs (shout it with me everyone: "My black motorcycle devil makes love beautifully!"). Like, biker zen, dude.

quentin124 for a Rocky Horror-style spiel or an MST3K setup. Just hum the Batman theme every time it goes to a cheesy headon driving shot, go heavy on the blind guy jokes when Raymond's driving in shades, slather on the sadomasochism references, keep your kraut/frog jokes handy, and dump as many putdowns of the style on it as you can, focusing on the 2001-ripoff psychedelic bits, the pitch black midnight chalet sex scene, and whatever really annoys you in particular about this flick. Give a loud cheer at the ending. Be thankful that it's only 90 minutes. Hopefully, you'll be able to catch this on a movie channel or some midnight screening, and won't have to pay more than 5 bucks up front for the chance to go from anticipation to "WTF is this dreck?" to gleeful outright mockery. And since you've read this, you can skip the first two and go straight to the right way to approach it.