Spoiler Alert: It wasn't an easy ride!

Movie: Easy Rider

Rank: 84

Year: 1969 Director: Dennis Hopper

Cast: Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper, Jack Nicholson

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What started as a hippie’s guide to road trips ended up serving as more of a cautionary tale of intolerance toward counterculture.

Two best friends set out on a road trip to Mardi Gras, only to have a movie resolution that I was not expecting.

As the movie started, my first thought was, “Oh, is this from where this song originates?”

My next thought? “Is it safe to snort coke and then hit the road?

Drugs, the real star of the film, takes center stage without any bold political statement on how they should or should not be legalized. Rather, these “easy riders” are just ready for a good time. Coke on the occasion, but marijuana on the regular.

Integrating some innovative camera angles, the vehicle’s mirror allows the reflection to capture all of the goings-on in and out of the car.

While I will say the ending shocked me, what is truly shocking is the productivity of these men while actually smoking pot during the filming. A sense of melancholy I detected early on from Fonda, I now suspect, is just his stoic reaction to smoking a joint.

These men would be Dennis Hopper, who in his youth reminds me of a Pedro Pascal whose style guide is Sully from Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman, and Peter Fonda, who rocks a boho Americana style.

Neither of them can actually be all that comfortable out on the road with their arms extended straight.

"It's not every man that can live off the land, you know. You do your own thing in your own time. You should be proud."

- Wyatt, Easy Rider

First stop? A rancher with a large family. His lifestyle, clearly juxtaposing theirs as they fix a tire in his barn with him clinking away on a horseshoe.

Nonetheless, they keep driving, with Fonda’s Wyatt willing to pick up a hitchhiker.

The first hitchhiker is looking for a ride to his commune. There is even a group shot, where the camera circles the room and no one looks happy. This kind of camerawork is a bit odd feeling taken out of the context of That ‘70s Show.

I don’t know if I needed to see Fonda swimming naked, but hey, I have. He and Hopper’s Billy seemed intrigued by the pull of the free-loving people, but they kept on their way.

A few more landscape shots of riders along a picturesque backdrop, these bikers soon find themselves arrested for illegally parading.

"Dude means, uh, nice guy, you know. Dude means: regular sort of person."

- Wyatt, Easy Rider

Who better to be your jailhouse bestie than Jack Nicholson, the new Dustin Hoffman of this list? A clear drunk lawyer who exudes the privilege life has given him as he casually leaves jail and takes his new buddies with him.

His reward? A fun road trip ending in utter devastation as the newest hitchhiker.

The epithet I assigned to Fonda so eloquently during my film note-taking: the collector of crazies.

I must say, he and our protagonists’ previous hitchhiker are almost as close as humanly possible to a stranger. While I can’t imagine hitting the road, thumb-up, looking for a new ride, I know for sure that new ride would not be a motorcycle.

The perk of Nicholson: he encourages at least one of our main men to wear a helmet. Forever my pet peeve, helmets are more than bike ornamentation. Thank god, since Nicholson pairs a day-old suit worn during a bender with an old football helmet.

Style icon: that drunk lawyer with whom you shared a jail cell.

Now, this is where our story goes off the rails, or moreover skidding off the road. While stopping by a diner, these three fellas gain the attention of horny girls and judgmental men.

Now, when I look someone up and down and deem them not worthy of my time, I move on. These men, in their small-minded, testosterone-filled rage?

They decide beating sleeping men with bats is not simply assault and murder, but moreover a fun night-time outing.

"If god did not exist it would be necessary to invent him."

- Wyatt, Easy Rider

What I did not expect to see going into this movie was a dead Nicholson, asleep on the side of the road. I did not expect a saddened Fonda and Hopper deciding to hit the road after grabbing his belongings to send home.

I would be remiss to not mention the odd jump cuts used to flash back and forth between a current scene and the next throughout the film. One of my least favorite features, if I saw correctly, it looked like they lit Nicholson ablaze.

As a pair of classy men would, our heroes set out to the high-class brothel with artwork-adorned walls. Convincing these women to leave their hallowed halls, they pop some drugs in a cemetery and have what appears to be an awful trip.

Fast-forward through the intercutting of sexual acts, tear-filled moments, nude chilling and all-out panic, they part ways.

During these Mardi Gras scenes, I can’t tell if the grainier quality of the film during night shoots was just the technology of the time or an artistic choice. As an older film, I will accept either answer and just decide to buy into suspending my disbelief.

Our easy riders, casually driving down the road are passed by two men in a truck relying on ever hick stereotype of intolerance and looking to scare them with a shot. Was this light tone a joke or were they shit shooters? Either way, Billy goes flying back from the gun. A horrified Wyatt takes off after the men. A shot with his bike flying back sets a clear picture of this resolution.

Two men, funded by drug money on the way to “The Big Easy” found the open road and the people along the way to be quite difficult. An easy ride, maybe. An easy death? Certainly not.

P.S. I have always wanted a VW van, one adorned with flowers and not stuffed with a marijuana cloud surrounding Sean Penn.

P.P.S. Yes, I pulled details of this movie in order to make a reference to Fast Times at Ridgemont High.