(Photo © J. Maus)
Veer, the full-length documentary that offers a glimpse into Portland’s bike culture, will premiere tonight (7:30 pm) at the Hollywood Theater. The show is sold out (but I hear a few tickets will be made available at the door) and it’s sure to be an exciting evening.
If you haven’t heard about the film, check out my review or watch the trailer at VeerTheMovie.com.
So far, I’ve watched it with the filmmakers and the cast and crew and both times I’ve gotten a bit teary-eyed in parts. I love it, but being so close to the stories and the people in the film (not to mention I’ve been documenting this stuff for years now) my perspective is a bit strange. I’m very curious how the movie will come across to the general public (especially folks that aren’t “in the bike community”).
If you’re one of the lucky ticket holders, would you be kind enough to share your thoughts on the film in the comments below?
Thanks for reading.
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Scalpers ?
I have a couple of tickets I can let go of. email me if interested brewcaster @ gm*il.c*m
hey Dan,
the scalpers comment was my bad attempt at a joke… i deleted it.
To be clear, they will be free, not selling them. First come first served.
I’ve got my confirmation number…
I’m looking foreward to seeing it, and meeting so many of the regulars here!
When is the showing for this movie?
7pm is the showtime, but get there early if you want one of the remaining unreserved tickets!
Sorry, 7:30 is the showtime, not 7.
i have a ticket and wont be able to attend,
email me @ johnsignerATgma*l.co* & i can pass on my confirmation #
How was this publicised? If I had known about this, I would have bought a ticket. I did not know about it until I saw the article this afternoon. It wasn’t on the featured events here on bikeportland?
Can any of you tell me when the next time it will be playing here in PDX so I can get tickets ahead of time?
Thanks
Cleara
i just got back in from the film and really enjoyed getting to see a wide variety of various aspects of portland’s diverse bike culture… but, i think about 20 minutes could have been edited out while still keeping impact of the movie.
Mark (#10) – it was sent direct e-mail to anyone who signed up for the mailing list for the movie, which was promoted in 2 prior BikePortland posts. It was mentioned directly in this post:
http://bikeportland.org/2008/11/10/cast-and-crew-get-first-look-at-veer/
and it was posted to the Shift list:
https://lists.riseup.net/www/info/shift
You couldn’t buy tickets, it was a free showing.
Veer has been accepted to a film festival in British Columbia, and I’m pretty sure there will be other showings – the best way to be informed on them would be to subscribe to the mailing list at:
http://veerthemovie.com/emailupdates.asp
Veer is a great film – the cut shown was a work print (almost final), and has a few rough spots in the sound. Some of the footage taken while riding is a bit jerky, and if you’re easily motion-sick, I wouldn’t sit in the front row. The movie starts with an overview of Portland’s bike culture and the five principal people in the documentary. There were 300 hours of footage shot, condensed to a 98 minute film. A few spots in the movie were slow, and some of the scenes (most notably the Salem bill-passage scenes) could do with a little more editing for brevity. But overall, the film has a good progression thematically, and ends on an upbeat note.
I think that Greg Fredette, Jason Turner, the cast and crew did a great job with this film, and I hope that it sees a DVD release in the near future.
Ideally, it would be great if the DVD release contained some of the footage that was cut, especially with a few of the other interviewees that didn’t make the cut into the final film.
Matt:
Thanks for the suggestion. I just did sign up at the Veer site and I have also joined the BTA, which was suggested by someone who I met with while hanging out at the site when the movie let out last night (I was the one with the lights . . .)
Mark
Thoughts on Veer,
Overall, pretty good. I do feel that they left out the most intriguing and unique aspect of Portland’s Bike Culture, the everyday bike commuter. Everyday, the bridges are packed with all kinds of people, dads or moms biking their kids to daycare, designers, engineers, lawyers, and people from every other field. This is what makes portland so different. Most larger cities have their bike extremes, but what we have is much different, much better.
That was a lot of fun! There were serious parts that gave moments to pause and think, but overall, it was a lot a fun!
I’m 2nding the desire to see some of the deleted scenes. This is one that when it’s available for purchase it’s going into my library.
SPOILER ALERT
Enjoyed the film…a somewhat disconnected mish-mash of stories, but that’s Portland for you. All the people were interesting and colorful. The segments on cyclists killed by cars and the tragedy this represents for their families was heartbreaking. The guy who took the Zoobomb Century title has a certain star quality. The sections on the Sprockettes were really fun & poignant. Like the Sprockettes, I guess.
The most unusual thing to me was the audience was cheering and booing at the heroes & villains throughout the segment on lobbying and legislation in Salem. I never thought I’d see that!!
I’d give it 5 out of 5 stars for bike people, maybe 3/5 for anybody else.
I also thought the movie was a lot of fun and the makers deserve a round of applause. It was a great environment in which to watch the movie, especially due to the food and drinks and fellow bikers. But, I did think some parts of the bike scene here in town were missing.
The film could have added some brief content of some of the more everyday bikers who commute to work, pull their kids in trailers to school, gave up their cars, etc. Also, some extra interviews could have been conducted pulling in some more businesses, elected officials, bike shop owners, etc. to follow a few more cases besides just hearing a lot from the 5 selected people. (Also, I wish the guy who yelled “open your dumpsters” about 67 times would have relaxed a bit more.) Just some thoughts. But, overall it was great! Fun movie!
the CCC seriously does need to open their dumpsters.
they are taking bikes off the street and melting them down for a couple bucks on the ton.
“open your dumpsters!” wasn’t me, but i support the message. go twitch!
Great film! Loved it!
(And my junk looks larger on the big screen!)
I’ve uploaded my pictures to flickr…
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ufobike/sets/72157609920426615/
Spoiler alert… I did not take any pictures of the movie itself…
Yes, the CCC needs to let us reuse their trash so we can keep doing cool stuff that people want to make movies about.
Seriously, this needs to happen!
I liked the movie too…
Movie was well intended, but too long, too much about Zoo/Sprockette, disjointed, and failed to touch on the racing scene (any facet of, cross, road, etc) and left out the commuter completely.
It tries to be a human interest story and a documentary, but falls short on both accounts. A valiant effort, but more like an extended piece from the 5:00 o’clock news than anything.
How many Zoobombers and Sprockettes do you think commute by bicycle only? Most of them perhaps?
I liked it, and of course it did not cover all aspects or the bike community, but it did a good job with what was explored.
Completely unbiased, as i am, i would say there was clearly not enough clownarchy in the movie VEER..
also there was to much of that guy who took his bike to europe.. and something i still can’t put my finger on. I’ll get back to you about that.
All and all, it gave me some great ideas, and I hope it spreads far and wide.