Rodeo

Hot-tempered and fiercely independent, Julia finds escape in a passion for motorcycles and the high-octane world of urban ‘Rodeos’ - illicit gatherings where riders show off their bikes and their latest daring stunts. After a chance meeting Julia finds herself drawn into a clandestine biker gang and, striving to prove herself to the ultra-masculine group, she is faced with a series of escalating demands that will make or break her place in the community. With nail biting stunts and a brilliant non-professional cast, Lola Quivoron’s ferocious debut has marked her out as an exciting new talent to watch.

Rodeo was born out of the meeting with the community I had been following for years and my intimate desire to see a young woman rider one day lift her bike. Rodeo is for me an epic and sur-naturalist film. It goes beyond the naturalism of Au Loin Baltimore, in its relationship to colour, narrative and direction. It pushes filmmaking to the very limit. We shot with an Arri Alexa Mini camera, in a cinemascope format (2:39), with anamorphic Master Prime lenses. Like the classic westerns. This gives a spectacular strength to the documentary look that I also wanted to preserve. I wanted to make people physically feel the bodies carried away by the speed and adrenaline of bike-life. To show the brutal side of it, the relationship to death, to the asphalt.

Director Lola Quivoron