Over the Bars

By Elizabeth Trickett

Couch potato time

Riding from the comfort of your couch: Roam Movie Review

Many mountain bike films are cheesier than a box of Ritz Bits, filled with immature antics, lifeless commentaries and enough crashes to keep Sixsixone’s factory pulling overtime. The Collective’s second effort, Roam, manages to avoid these pitfalls-though a few mouth-gaping crashes are worthy of rubbernecking- and captures the heart and soul of what it’s like to scream down a mountain on two wheels.

As with the Collective’s self-titled first effort, Roam nicely defines the elusive concept of freeriding. The cinematographers and directors, Darcy Wittenburg and Jamie Houssain, explore the idea of freedom. In mountain biking, there is no destination and to roam is to ride without boundaries. All the scenes feel happened upon and spontaneous. This is partly due to the directors’ belief that less is more and each segment is tightly edited to keep the energy flowing.

The first scene begins with the rhythmic pounding of a nail into the boards of a skinny, surrounded by the lush forest of Vancouver. The pounding turns into a drumbeat and with a flash, Darren Berrecloth appears gliding over the skinny and later his brother Ryan joins him, flying over moss-covered boulders only to launch off the side of a towering tree. The Collective’s lenses capture the perfect angles and, at one point, it feels as if the camera is going to brush the sleeve of Berrecloth’s jersey. The zip line work that made their first film so exciting is used in spades this time, and they’ve upped the ante on the cinematography.

Check out The Collective's website for more details and screen shots.

The filmmaking has also evolved to bring the act of mountain biking out of the realm of sport and into a larger cultural sphere. The film is narrated to give a sense of place and to show riders as part of the history and religion of the culture whose dirt they’re stirring up. Mountain biking may appear to be a single, solitary act, but it is part of something larger. Ryan Leech’s adventures in Prague reflect this as he rolls past ancient statues and quietly bounces across park benches. He also balances on chain links and even manages a five-foot drop onto a thin rail. Who needs hours of crash footage when you’ve got Leech riding up the side of a tree and balancing like a squirrel on the end of a branch?

Discovery Channel buffs will enjoy the snippets of commentary that tie places and themes together. A brief narration presents a crash course history lesson before each ride, which adds life to the people and places. A segment in Morocco begins with native drumming and a street scene showing the bikes that serve as their transportation. The film pans to a group of children eying a row of massive downhill bikes and their shiny components. The native music morphs into a funky beat as young whizzes Matt Hunter and Thomas Vanderham saddle up. Hunter, without hesitation, launches off a massive drop and goes down in full fashion as he bounces and rolls from an off-camber landing, racking up one of the film’s few crashes. Like a good coach or riding partner, he’s shown three months later, back to prove that he will not be broken by the sharp drop. Without a hint of panic, he nails it the second time, taking a victory lap across the searing desert.

BMXers will find themselves drooling with envy as Jordie Lunn’s dad shares how he bought an excavator to move great mounds of dirt to his backyard so Lunn and his buddies could build jumps. Moab fans will be pleased to find shots of their beloved rocky landscape included. The filmmakers mix it up, however, by playing a beat-heavy reggae track that tells the story of a young man shipped off at war. You can’t help but place Steve Peat and Nathan Rennie in his shoes as the timeliness of the song echoes throughout the canyons.

The only bummer with Roam is that it only lasts around 40 minutes. Aside from a killer soundtrack that can stand on its own, there’s just as much special footage as the movie to enjoy after all is said and done. Like your favorite trail, it’s over before you know it, but every second of it is worth the price of admission and begs you to visit again.

For more information on Roam, check out The Collective’s website.