This almost wasn’t going to happen in theaters. The Bikeriders, a star-studded biker drama that looks like Martin Scorsese helming Sons of Anarchy, had a setback last year on the way to theaters. Disney/20th Century pictures decided to pull back on its release plan, but fortunately, Focus Features saw the value in bringing this film to the big screen.
This year, Tom Hardy and Austin Butler will join many more rough-riding actors (who you know and love) while roaring through cities and cornfields. Let’s get down to some finer details about this movie.
Plot
Biker soap operas are a mood, as the kids say, and Butler recently revealed (while speaking to Josh Brolin for Interview magazine) that one of the greatest parts of this project was Tom Hardy being a total hoot:
“[T]here’s an intimate sensitivity to The Bikeriders. It’s the roaring engines and the smell of grease that we got to be around. It was nice to go to something that felt more independent and play in that space for a bit. But one of the things I was thinking about earlier, when you were talking about that relaxation on set, was that Tom Hardy surprised me. I pictured him to be this grizzly bear, always serious. And really, he’s one of the funniest people I’ve ever met. He’d be joking around until action is called, and then go into being the most intense guy I’d ever seen.”
The Bikeriders takes its name and inspiration from photojournalist Danny Lyon’s stunning, same-named black-and-white photography book, which he gestated during and after his time with a real-life biker club in the 1960s.
The film revolves around an ensemble cast led by two Oscar nominees, Hardy (as Johnny), the mentor of Austin Butler’s up-and-comer Benny. Jodie Comer steps in as Benny’s Old Lady, Kathy, as their lives revolve around a Chicago-based meeting of the rumbles over the course of a decade. Naturally, the club will transform from being an idealistic group of outsiders to a more 1%-focused outlaw gang, and I can’t wait to see Hardy lose his sh*t over it.
Will this eventually be an awards-circuit film? Don’t count on it. TheInSneider previously relayed how the film went over well in festival format, but executives decided that a commercial focus would be better. So, it should be fun, which we need more of in theaters.
Cast
In addition to Hardy, Butler, and Comer, The Bikeriders stars Norman Reedus (as Funny Sonny), who already spends much of his own time zooming around on a bike, even with the likes of Happy Keanu Reeves. The film also features Boyd Holbrook, Michael Shannon, Damon Herriman, Karl Glusman, Beau Knapp, Mike Fast, Toby Wallace, and Happy Anderson.
Release Date
Six months later than its planned Disney release date, Focus Features will drop The Bikeriders into theaters on June 21, 2024. Given that superheroes will almost certainly not be dominating the box office this summer, these can be moviegoers’ antiheroes, and you know what? It’s about damn time. Let’s ride, y’all.
Trailer
Below, you can see Jodie Comer wash away the last of Villanelle while falling for a semi-greasy Butler.
