I'm an admirer of Jack Cardiff's earlier work as a cinematographer with name directors which included Hitchcock, Huston and Powell & Pressburger amongst many others although I must admit that this very much of its time film with elements of art-house, psychedelia, road movie and soft porn isn't one I'd normally associate with him.

It's an odd film, thin on plot but thick on plastering Marianne Faithfull and to a lesser extent Alain Delon's naked bodies over the screen. She's Rebecca the stuffy old village bookkeeper's daughter, drifting into marriage with stuffy young schoolteacher Raymond, until she encounters Delon's mean and moody Daniel on the continent and it's not long before she enters the lion's den in establishing a physical connection with him. But tortured soul Daniel isn't interested in a lasting relationship and seems quite happy to leave the girl in torment which he compounds by gifting her a spanking new motorbike as a teasing reminder of their tryst as in between their lovemaking sessions he's handily taught her how to ride his motorbike.

The ending you can almost literally see coming round the corner in a way that Rebecca clearly didn't and it is most shockingly and effectively done, but you have to say that pretty much all that went before it was rather dull, pretentious stuff and nonsense. For every carefully crafted landscape shot, with Cardiff employing so many airborne tracking shots you wonder he didn't invent the drone shot fifty years early, there are just as many awful back projection shots of Faithfull in particular but also Delon tearing it up on the road. Then just to firmly date-stamp his film as being made in 1968, he employs weird saturated colour effects usually when the horny couple are in bed.

Of course both Delon and Faithfull for different reasons, were hot at the time but they're hardly required to act. One suspects in fact the film was little more than a vehicle (sorry!) to get them naked together, although I had to smile at one point at the strategically placed vase of flowers covering Delon's manhood while elsewhere of course, pretty much all of Faithfull's anatomy is on show, even if only in glimpses.

Weighed down in addition by a dull soundtrack, I'm afraid this feature just never clicked into top gear (sorry again!) for me at all.

The 1960s brought some very interesting films--especially with society's changing mores. Some of these untraditional stories were very successful (such as "Bonnie and Clyde", "Rosemary's Baby". "Tom Jones" and "The Graduate") and some were just downright silly (such as ALL the films about LSD). "The Girl on a Motorcycle" is clearly one of these unsuccessful films that runs from traditional structure and morality but doesn't work because the plot is paper-thin and the characters are just as deep. It's a curious curio--but nothing more.

The film begins with a young bride stealing her husband's motorcycle and driving across Europe to meet a lover in Germany. Along the way, she takes off her clothes with little provocation, makes love and just lives for the moment and for her own desires. Why does she do all this? You assume she's just an immature jerk, that's why! No real depth--just a pretty but thoroughly unlikeable lady 'doing her thing'. And, in a case of self-indulgence on the director's part, you see lots of psychedelic colors (for no apparent reason) from time to time.

I really don't think the film was designed at all for the average person--and they probably never would have sat through this thing. My feeling is that it was meant to be a fusion--a film for the hippies and artsy types. As I said, it's a curio but not a film most folks would particularly enjoy. As for me, I may be crazy, but I like a modicum of depth to the films I watch. Heck, this film has LESS depth than a Sylvester Stallone flick!

All in all, a waste of a good motorcycle and even the occasional glimpses of the star naked aren't enough to keep this interesting!

THE GIRL ON A MOTORCYCLE is very much a film of its day, and how much you like it depends on your taste for Swinging Sixties' psychedelia. I didn't care for it much at all, but then I always prefer plotting to abstract artiness. This one begins with some crazy psychedelia and regularly peppers the narrative with weird moments, but for the most part it's just the narration of a dullish girl riding around the European countryside on her motorbike. Marianne Faithfull does her best but if we're honest is only presented as a sex object and nothing more, and Alain Delon hardly gets the opportunity to shine, either.