The Wild Angels (1966)

Typical Hollywood trash. Nothing clever, original or entertaining here. I feel sorry for anyone who paid money and wasted their time watching this. I am amazed that this movie made money. Further proof America is completely lacking in intelligence, culture, taste, and can be so easily entertained. Even sadder is the fact this probably made money in Europe. I can only imagine real Hell's Angels watching this farce. A short film of them watching this mess might actually be entertaining.

Mildly amusing nonsense from producer / director Roger Corman that predates the biker film craze by a few years. Peter Fonda, who would go on to co-star in and co-write the seminal biker flick "Easy Rider", stars here as "Heavenly Blues", leader of a pack of Hells Angels. They don't seem to have much of a purpose other than loving life and getting into fights on a regular basis. The admittedly slim story (credited to longtime Corman associate Charles B. Griffith), which is largely supplemented by filler, mostly deals with this gangs' attempt to do right by a fallen member, who gets shot by the police in an escape attempt.Maybe it *would* help to have a few beers on hand while watching this trash flick. While this viewer wouldn't consider it great fun, it's reasonably entertaining. Not much of note ever really happens, but there are enough exploitative moments along the way. Many criticisms of the movie insist that it dates badly, but that's not necessarily a terrible thing in my opinion. It *does* make this interesting as an artifact of its era, complete with a monologue by Mr. Blues to a weary preacher (Frank Maxwell). Said monologue is an absolute hoot.While "The Wild Angels" did make stars out of Fonda, Nancy Sinatra, Bruce Dern, and Diane Ladd, the acting wouldn't exactly have been award worthy. It gets the job done, though. If Fonda succeeds at nothing else, he succeeds at being cool. Sinatra's just sort of there. A fair amount of familiar faces in the supporting cast, too: Buck Taylor, Norman Alden, Michael J. Pollard, Joan Shawlee, Gayle Hunnicutt, and the always welcome Dick Miller. Future director Peter Bogdanovich, Cormans' assistant on this show, wore a few hats, as he also did uncredited work on the cinematography, editing, and script, and as an assistant director. Mike Curb is credited with the score, Monte Hellman with the editing.Good for about an hour and a half of non-think entertainment.Six out of 10.

Bad movies are made all the time. Some are made by amateurs, while others are made by the highest of production companies. Along with that, some films even have a solid cast and still messed it up somehow. It should make viewers wonder to themselves what the heck possessed these actors to take part in such strange concoctions. In this mid 1960s film, Roger Corman, the man best known for The Little Shop of Horrors (1960) is in the director's chair. Starring in the film is a young Peter Fonda and Nancy Sinatra. Together, these two actors head a biker gang known as "The Wild Angels" (based on an actual biker group "Hell's Angels").It's after the rolling intro credits where the narrative is lost. Credited as the so-called writer to this movie is Charles B. Griffith, a man who has produced several other works with Corman. Why didn't Corman see how bad the screenplay was? There is literally no part of the plot that is engaging enough for any audience. The only thing that is presented is the behavior of this gang, which doesn't help. The behavior of the gang is reckless, brash and even stupid. In one scene, a bunch of bonehead bikers hop on their bikes to chase a rabbit. A rabbit.The mentality of this gang is to be "free" and ride their machines without having to answer to "the man". You know, the basic 60s perspective of most rebels. Roger Corman may have been trying to get this message across, but it is done in such a way that is so late in the running time, that by the time the topic is brought up, the audience will already be asleep. It's almost like he was just trying to capitalize on the craze at the time. Let's also not forget the symbol of "The Wild Angels" - the Swastika? Yeah, just how exactly is portraying this in any film other it being about Nazis or Charles Manson sound like a good idea? Point being, it isn't. No one should be proud to represent that symbol. How is that Peter Fonda, Nancy Sinatra and others found it to be a wise career choice?The dialog isn't anything special either. The characters have no meat to them. Plus, there are little to any characterizations among the leads that are presented to the viewers. Peter Fonda's character says "Shut Up" way too often. Nancy Sinatra's character keeps asking if Fonda's character still loves her (and he can't make up his mind). Nothing is explained to why the characters act the way they do on a personal level. The sole activities that matter to this group of neanderthals is riding their bikes, getting high, getting laid and having meaningless brawls. None of it is appealing, all the way up to the very last minute of the film. Michael J. Pollard best known for his role in Tango & Cash (1989) as Owen even has a role and can't help lift the entertainment level. Forget background music, nowhere close to being on target with the tone of the film. No wonder the real "Hell's Angels" filed a lawsuit!A story barely exists here. The characters are as transparent as glass, the music is irrelevant and the events that take place are meaningless.

This film is a wonderful example of how writer/director/producer Roger Corman had a knack out of making cheap films that made lots of money. Oddly, of all his MANY credits, apparently only one of his films lost money--and, even more oddly, it was one of his best films! Here with "Wild Angels" you have essentially a crap film with some actors who later became famous--and it made a fortune. Corman must have laughed himself silly with this one!! Bruce Dern, Peter Fonda and Nancy Sinatra was all members of the Angels--a sort of biker 'club'. For 1966, they were a pretty scary and tough bunch--though compared to some of the biker films that followed (such as "Satan's Sadists"), they are a relatively mellow group. Sure, they have gang fights, rapes, drug use and altercations with the cops, but otherwise they are all relatively clean-cut thugs with swastikas bedecking practically everything! Early in the film, the gang is having a friendly rumble with a Hispanic gang. After a bit of eye-gouging and the like, the cops show and try to catch the fun-loving guys. One of them (Dern) is eventually caught--and in the process he's very badly hurt. The gang of braniacs decide to break in to the hospital and rescuing them. In the process, the critically injured Dern dies--I guess unplugging him from all the equipment was a bad idea after all! This leads to a lovely funeral sendoff at which time the gang runs amok--destroying a church. In a case of HEAVY padding, this sequence seems to go on and on and on--mostly to stretch the film to full-length and to shock the viewers. It literally makes up almost half the film with the various sacrilegious activities that occur there (including a rape--which, fortunately, is implied and not shown in any detail) and at the grave site. I think the padding is so bad that I frankly found most of this pretty boring! All in all, it's a film in search of a plot--which, sadly, it seems to lack. A gang fights, a leader dies, they fight some more...end of story....and Corman laughing all the way to the bank since a lot of kids went to see this bilge with one-dimensional characters. Now I am not anti-biker film--I just want to see a good one, which this is not.