Bicycle Film Festival
Published 39 months ago
Close to 4,000 cycling and film fanatics get together for LA's Bicycle Film Festival.
- Text by Ashira Siegl
The Bicycle Film Festival started off with a bang this year as 11,000 people attended festival parties and film screenings in NYC, the festival's home base. The next stop on the 16 city worldwide tour was Los Angeles, CA from June 28 – July 1. While Smog City is not known for being particularly bicycle friendly, the burgeoning bicycle community of Los Angeles welcomed the bike love with open arms, and my hopes that the Bicycle Film Festival in LA would compare to the energy that it has in NY were surpassed!
The Bicycle Film Festival teamed up with Dance Right and Obey Giant to host Bike's Rock!, the opening night party. The line to get inside the packed party spilled down the block as hordes of riders continued to roll up and lock their bikes to poles, fences and anything else in the area. We met up with friends from across the country, and danced the night away in hot, sweaty anticipation of the films we wanted to see most.
During the next two days, close to 4,000 cycling and film fanatics caught 2007's offering of bicycle themed flicks from around the world. They gathered on the star-studded sidewalk outside the Vine Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard. Valet bicycle attendants took turns parking bikes as more riders made their way inside the theatre. The long row of bicycles, parked flush against each other, stretched halfway down the block. Puma's Re-Bike bicycles were on display at the theatre as well.
At just seven years old, The Bicycle Film Festival has gone from being a local NYC niche film festival to a full force international celebration of film, art and bicycle themed culture.
From the narrative feature "Monkey Warfare", which won Jury Selection at the Toronto International Film Festival, to the animated zombie short "Night of the Living Bicycles" and the fast paced documentaries of Lucas Brunelle, who chases alleycat racers through cities around the world with his helmet camera, we were treated to many different genres of film. Gary Fisher and Joe Breeze, the 'Grandfathers of Mountain Biking', cruised down Hollywood Blvd on their bicycles for the LA premiere of Billy Savage's "Klunkerz", the "Dogtown and Z-boys" of mountain biking. Bicycle Film Festival founding director, Brendt Barbur, and many of this year's filmmakers were present for introductions, Q&A's, celebratory bike rides and parties.
The weekend of festivities ended with a street party in the newly dubbed (but not yet official) "Bicycle District", home of the Bicycle Kitchen, a non-profit bicycle repair shop. The Bicycle Bell Ensemble performed and street partier's got to cool off with smoothies made by the Bikerowave's bicycle powered blender. The day's bicycle competitions and games, including track bike and BMX events, gave way to a massive dance party in the streets as the festival came to a close.
If you missed the Bicycle Film Festival in Los Angeles, you can catch up as it travels around the globe. The festival will visit London Oct. 16 – Oct 20, but the next stop is Paris, France where Joy Ride, the Bicycle Film Festival's touring art exhibit, is currently showing at Colette. It features the bicycle themed artwork of Swoon, Michel Gondry, Phil Frost, Steve MacDonald, Taliah Lempert, and many others.
