BikeBiz Bicycle and cycling retail news
Premium Rush is the first mainstream fixie flick since Kevin Bacon’s Quicksilver of 1986. It will be released in January in America, and February in the UK.
The movie spiel says: "Dodging speeding cars, crazed cabbies, open doors, and eight million cranky pedestrians is all in a day’s work for Wilee (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), the best of New York’s agile and aggressive bicycle messengers. It takes a special breed to ride the fixie – super lightweight, single-gear bikes with no brakes and riders who are equal part skilled cyclists and suicidal nutcases who risk becoming a smear on the pavement every time they head into traffic."
In this case, "pavement" means road surface not pavement in the UK sense – but the movie is bound to feature lots of sidewalk riding and pedestrian dodging, confirming in some people’s minds that all cyclists are scofflaws, although when chase scenes feature law-breaking motorists (ie all chase movies), nobody would think of smearing all motorists as scofflaws.
The action scenes in Premium Rush certainly look exciting, although the graphic sequences of SUVs smashing into messengers won’t do a great deal to promote urban cycling.
Sales of bike locks may go up: Kryptonite chains are used in a number of imaginative ways, such as destroying taxi wing mirrors.
Premium Rush is directed by David Koepp, screenwriter on films such as Jurassic Park, Mission: Impossible, Spider-Man and other blockbusters.
Quicksilver (1986):
