Booty Wolfsbane

Having exhausted joyride potential in a 50 mile radius from home, Labann has begun to consider driving to daytrip starts. Same old scenery suggests what’s alluring in countrysides, galling nearby to sensibilities, and going or staying wrong in cities, which then taints social media entries. Contentious talk among quarantined crazies turns to pandemic blowback and revolutionary resistance to solemn guidance once majority begins to act as if they’re exempt from disease; gives new meaning to phrase "gone viral”. Many more will be gone permanently if they lower their guard in even the least instance. Horrific things occur right after officials announce “all clear” and you relax vigilance, particularly when it comes to economy.

Already intuited that CARES Act would disproportionately help richest, because so-called representatives care a lot more about corporate campaign donors than hundreds of millions of hand-to-mouth constituents. While those who earn over $100,000/year don’t get a $1,200/person stimulus check, the wealthiest forty-three thousand will get on average $2.6 million in other benefits buried deep in small print, potentially $11.2 billion. Trillions in relief will also transfer to bankers, credit holders, insurers, tax coffers, and whatever obligations you can’t ignore. Covert intent was to make majority complicit in the biggest swindle in nation’s history. Few will see it this way, so tax cheats will get away with not having to pay. Did you expect something better than yesterday? Nobody much cares, settles without struggle, so nothing improves. “As we wage war on an invisible enemy... America will triumph yet again---and rise to new heights of greatness,” says Trump, though he and his pirate pals alone stand to plunder booty. Who’s really your worst adversary? How do you protect yourself? Which is worse, being starved or dodging bullets?

Things ignored eventually get noticed, including any pivotal but small bicycle appearance in films, another reason to pay closer attention. Cheerless biopic about Conan creator and pulp writer Robert E. Howard describes The Whole Wide World (Dan Ireland, dir., 1996) of early 20th Century wordsmiths. Media then mostly meant classroom lessons, neighborhood gossip and old wives’ tales. You had to bike down to drug store to find something actually entertaining, and sat on a curb devouring latest comic book, lurid magazine, or strange story anthology drinking a bottle of Nehi. A dearth of ideas can prove deadly, but what of too many? Alligient citizens ride today’s waves of business mergers, community neglect, criminal onslaughts, and uninvited door-to-door numbskulls who resent pandemic, so risk lives begging, cheating, proselytizing, and selling. You never have to answer door or phone, of course.

Things seem to be looking up for nearly illiterate teen Reese Witherspoon, seen riding happily on homeboy beau Bokeem Woodbine’s handlebars at high school, but usually that’s when bottom falls out. After crackhead mom and deviant stepdad go back to jail, just before fiancé gets gunned down in a drive-by shooting, she takes to the Freeway (Matthew Bright, dir., 1996) to grandmother’s place. Junker car breaks down, naturally, so she naïvely accepts a ride with big bad wolf Kiefer Sutherland, who reveals himself to be the serial murderer/rapist of trailer trash shown in news and sought by police. When she feistily fights back, bane to wolves who figure age and sophistication gives them an edge, mayhem ensues. Strong arguments are made for educating youth better and leaving none behind.

Based on actual events, everything is not Hunky Dory (Marc Evans, dir., 2011) for working class bicycling brothers Angus and Davy (Aneurin Barnard) in 1976 Wales, who get abused by classmates and conservative drunk of a father. In a tender moment dad imparts a lesson on fixing tube punctures. Angus berates Davy by insulting his flighty girlfriend: "Don't know why you bother. Stella. Everyone knows she's a school bike." Teacher Viv (Minnie Driver) tries against setbacks to stage an updated version of Shakespeare's Tempest using contemporary music from David Bowie (thus the title) and others.

There are tantalizing titles, such as dating angst flick Fish without a Bicycle (Brian Green, dir., 2003), that, as advertised, are devoid of bici-culture, hardly any outdoor scenes even. Then there are films specifically about cycling with titles that one might not pick up on. Speculative documentary King of Mont Ventoux (Fons Feyaerts, dir., 2013) pits reputations of five famous peloton stars - Bernard, Gárante, Merckx, Pantani, Virenque - to place one on a pedestal as sole champion of this Bald Giant of Provence and penultimate climb stage of Tour de France, using archival footage, contemporary interviews, and informed arguments. For it Nits produced an original soundtrack. Pity poster boy for illegal doping Lance Armstrong, who respectfully gave Pantani that stage win in 2000, arguably the best duel in Tour history,  wasn’t considered. John McCutcheon made Original Song about Lance Armstrong and Barack Obama, Peter Joseph Head & Pascal Babare penned Lance Armstrong (Mont Ventoux), and others composed 4 more about this scandalized Texan. Eddy “The Cannibal” Merckx has equally been honored in at least 6 songs and Marco “The Pirate” Pantani 14. Since, in 2016 and spectacular fashion, frontrunner Chris Froome was knocked down by a pileup caused by a motorcyclist and ran on foot sans bike before hopping on a teammate's to finish this stage.

In offbeat comedy 3.2.1 Frankie Go Boom (Jordan Roberts, dir., 2012), deadbeat druggie and wannabe director Chris O’Dowd tormented baby brother Charlie Hunnam with cringeworthy videos from child through adulthood. Charlie is guilted by mother into attending recovering sibling’s coming-out-of-rehab ceremony, after which jilted bicyclist Lizzy Caplan literally crashes into him. She is so desperate and drunk, they connect for a hesitant one-night stand. Chris makes yet another embarrassing video of their fumbling rendezvous that gets millions of internet hits, triggers a string of misadventures, and sells brother’s car without permission. Soon Charlie, like Lizzy, also has to ride a bike to get around.

Bike culture on full display over the course of one night, lean bike messenger Jenny Strubin, shown en route to an unsanctioned race on Chicago streets called The Alley Cat (Marie Ullrich, dir., 2013), struggles to deal with one loss after the next. Ex lover Tom Reigel crashes after cut off by a car and sustains a fatal injury, a pervert propositions then stalks her until she can elude him, then she visits her “niece” at dawn, though viewers suspect she gave up her daughter along with nearly everything else to pursue a cycling lifestyle.

Called on the carpet and told his office would be consolidated with another more distant, dour civil servant Eddie Marsan (director and star) volunteers to buy a bicycle to make commute possible. Instead sacked, he faces his final case for Client Services, where he arranges state funerals and investigates people who’ve died alone to bring some closure to estranged families, mostly without success. With bikes on a rack outside, he finally locates right fish & chip joint where last client last worked, so funeral for once consists of more bereaved than he alone in Still Life (2013). Dignity for dearly departed might be moot when multitudes die while trying to stay away from contagion. Many may see, but not all understand.

Katie Holmes plays mild mannered vigilante Miss Meadows (Karen Leigh Hopkins, dir., 2014), who gets bailed out by bicyclist pedophile recidivist Callan Mulvey when he tries to kill her with her own pistol, thus imparting fingerprints which link him to serial murders instead of her. She marries sheriff James Badge Dale, and lives happily ever after as a force for justice in a twisted world full of criminals who think avenging angels don’t exist and preying upon innocents will never be opposed. 

In a bizarre reversal of Miss Meadows, neocon London bicycling bobby Kevin Bishop asks, "May I Kill U?" (Stuart Urban, dir., 2014) before deciding whether criminals deserve to be executed on the spot. He wasn't always such a rogue enforcer; a vicious punk stuck a pipe into wheel of his Smith & Wesson cruiser [shown], he flipped over onto his head, then his migraines began to trigger traumatic responses. Police walk a tightrope between downfalling and upstanding, but given what scum they have to wrangle daily, it's difficult to agree that defunding solves anything. Authority and power do corrupt, but not automatically or necessarily; conscience and intelligence usually choose correctly in hot scenarios.   

In short The Gift (Gabriel Robertson, dir., 2015), eleven year old Elvis (Brady Permenter) goes into town with mom Gladys (Amye Gousset) to buy himself a birthday present from his modest savings. Though, “nervous as a long tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs,” mom’s resigned that it will be the dangerous bicycle which Forrest Bobo (Xander Berkeley) shows in hardware store’s front window, but youngster has changed his mind and rather have a rifle. Mom is horrified and refuses. Bobo persuades him to take a guitar instead. A true story, the Presleys return to their Tupelo, Mississippi farm, a real journey to rock and roll kingship begins, and the rest is history. According to recently discovered photos, Elvis got his first bike at age 13, just before moving to Memphis.

Another Men in Black moment occurs when immortal Henry Rollins begins to open up to waitress Kate Greenhouse about why He Never Died (Jason Krawczyk, dir., 2015). Bicyclists drift past in busy downtown backdrop as he lists all jobs he held during his millennia on Earth. But he fails to mention until later being named in the Bible (Adam’s wayward son Cain), defending the helpless, or working hard to kick his addiction to villain flesh.

Max & Leon (Jonathan Barré, dir., 2016) has comic stars David Marsais and Grégoire Ludig doing anything they can to avoid French military service during WWII, including disguising themselves as a bicycling priest and childish civilian. They probably wouldn’t have repelled Nazi invasion anyway. Luckily, allies stepped up to turn back fascists, though they never disappeared. After all hate speech Trump belched while on continual stump, no coincidence exist why cries of Antifa and Black Lives Matter persist. All lives matter, except bigots and idiots who’ve embraced evil as a lifestyle.

So, how do you navigate such Dark Waters (Todd Haynes, dir., 2019) really? In this legal thriller, attorney Mark Ruffalo, after years of defending questionable corporate practices, sues industry giant Dupont Chemical, who covered up company’s poisoning of seventy thousand West Virginians by dumping fluoropolymers into their drinking water. Hundreds of dead cows and rotting gums of local kids on bikes provides clear evidence that ultimately leads to nearly $1 billion in damages. Turns out, “Better Living Through Chemistry,” was no more than an unexamined slogan fraught with human casualties. Though devastating and disheartening, decades of toxins in low concentrations don’t kill nearly as quickly as viral bioweapons specifically engineered to wipe out entire populations.

Trailer for just released biopic King of Staten Island (Judd Apatow, dir., 2020) has nerdy antihero Pete Davidson debating a career opportunity as an NYC firefighter, since his firefighter dad was killed on duty. Bonding with this band of brothers in service to The Big Apple seems to include another nighttime group bike ride. Basic hook and ladder equipment includes a company helmet, Pete.