‘Easy Rider’: the one American movie that excited Michelangelo Antonioni
Hollywood might be the ultimate destination for the majority of aspiring American filmmakers, and even those hailing from the other side of the Atlantic, but it’s equally telling that Michelangelo Antonioni was just one of many influential international auteurs who had no interest in trying to crack the States.
Federico Fellini openly admitted that he’d contemplated the idea of mounting a Stateside production, only to realise that he’d have to make one too many compromises for his liking. He could admire from afar, but he was keenly aware he’d have to rein himself in, and he wasn’t willing to do it.
Ingmar Bergman preferred the ‘New Hollywood’ movement to the ‘French New Wave’ and admired plenty of American directors. Yet, he had his own set of reasons for refusing to abandon his native Sweden in favour of the bright lights and bigger budgets of Los Angeles.
Of course, Antonioni did dabble in English-language cinema, most famously with Blowup. It was still a long way away from Hollywood, though, with the classic psychological mystery thriller being shot in London with a cast comprised primarily of actors from the United Kingdom.
Ironically, he did eventually get there, and the results were disastrous. The 1970 effort Zabriskie Point was a resounding failure that was picked apart by critics and lambasted as the worst movie Antonioni had ever made by a considerable margin, with the box office catastrophe rubbing further salt into the wound.
Things didn’t go much better when he made The Passenger with Jack Nicholson, either, after a disagreement with the studio saw the star hold onto the rights to the well-received film for decades and refuse to let it be screened, re-released, or even distributed on home video before he eventually relented.
Neither of those two pictures had come to pass when Antonioni spoke to Charles Thomas Samuels in 1969, but his indifference towards American cinema spoke volumes. He quickly named Fellini and Luchino Visconti as his favourite Italian auteurs, but not a single name sprung to mind when Hollywood came up.
“I don’t have any favourite directors, in truth,” came the dismissive reply. Fortunately, there was one film he greatly admired, and it was one that ushered in a new era. “I was, however, very impressed by Easy Rider. There are many young men today who are breaking the rules of American cinema, and they interest me. I’ve noticed in their work the influence of underground films; this shows how fruitful the movement has been.”
His socks may not have been knocked off by the Tinseltown production line, but Antonioni could see that a change was preparing to blow through the American industry. Easy Rider was one of the seminal catalysts that ushered in ‘New Hollywood’, and it was good enough to secure rare praise from a legend who wasn’t exactly enamoured by the nation’s output.
