The Wild One is a 1953 outlaw biker film. It is remembered for Marlon Brando's portrayal of the gang leader Johnny Stabler as a juvenile delinquent, dressed in a leather jacket and riding a 1950 Triumph Thunderbird 6T. Acting opposite of Brando was Lee Marvin as a rival gang leader. This low-budget production had Brando playing a "rebel without a cause" two years before James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause (1955). The Wild One was based on a short story, "The Cyclists' Raid" by Frank Rooney, in the January 1951 issue of Harper's Magazine. The story was later published in book form as part of The Best American Short Stories 1952. The story took a cue from an actual biker street party on the Fourth of July weekend in 1947 in Hollister, California that was elaborately trumped up in Life Magazine, and dubbed the Hollister riot, with staged photographs of wild motorcycle outlaw revellers. The Hollister event is now celebrated annually. In the film, the town is located somewhere in California.
   While at one point Johnny does threaten Kathy that he could take their cafe apart so fast they won't know what hit them, if they don't stop "needling" him, the bikers for the most part are just generally rowdy in pursuit of a good time, and don't radiate the sinister menace seen in later biker movies based on the Hells Angels, some of whom actually appeared in those films. Indeed, a group of local vigilantes (led by a businessman) who try to take on the bikers are noticeably more unsympathetic (using their influence to obtain lenient treatment from law enforcement, brutally beating up Brando, and finally causing an accident in which a resident is killed and for which Brando is blamed). Interestingly, Sonny Barger, the notorious founder of the Oakland Hells Angels, stated in his memoir that he identified with Chino, and considered Johnny the bully. Barger later bought the striped shirt Marvin wears in the film at an auction.

Banned in the UK

Primary cast:

• Marlon Brando as Johnny Strabler and the narrator
• Mary Murphy as Kathie Bleeker
• Robert Keith as Sheriff Harry Bleeker
• Lee Marvin as Chino
• Jay C. Flippen as Sheriff Stew Singer
• Peggy Maley as Mildred
• Hugh Sanders as Charlie Thomas
• Ray Teal as Uncle Frank Bleeker
• Richard Farnsworth (uncredited)

External results