During the mid 1980's my kids used to watch these movies which for lack of a better description I will call Disaffected Teenage Hero movies. The classic example of which is The Legend of Billie Jean. They are typified by simple morality plays of clearly defined good and evil intentions which are implemented by equally simplistic actions on the part of almost superhuman bad guys and heros.

Virtually all appears lost until in the final closing moments the hero or heroine manages to totally subdue the bad guy. Same story here! Quicksilver features a moderately post pubescent Kevin Bacon (formerly successful stock trader who lost his family's savings on a deal gone bad) who has quit the business world and taken up with the Quicksilver bike messenger service. I guess that Kevin's character had been a cyclist in a previous life as his skills on two wheels are beyond compare. In fact the only character even close in skill levels (Laurence Fishburn) is killed off within the first fifteen minutes or so of the movie by... You guessed it, the bad guy, cleverly named Gypsy.

We also have thrown in the mandatory misunderstanding between a presumably left over from his previous life, hot ballet dancing, girlfriend and his new "just a friend"/hotty messenger girl.



Well Kevin eventually spends a few sleepless hours and saves the day for everybody by winning a killing on the market, restoring his family fortune and securing everybody's financial future, and kills off the bad guy in the same afternoon. This is truly mindless plot drivel.

But the bike scenes are terrific! There are some great bike in the city traffic shots the likes of which I have seen only on an internet MPEG by real NYC messengers racing through the city. Seriously the bike action makes the entire movie worth seeing and another must-have for the serious bike movie collector.

If for no other reason it is fun to watch just to keep track of which scenes are shot with real fixed gear bikes, which are coaster brakes, and which are ten speeds, all of which are dressed up to look like a particular single speed. It is also fun to watch Kevin Bacon do a very brief almost track stand as he exposes himself to the bad guy for the final chase. I hear Bacon actually got into riding when he made this movie and that he got good at it.

This is also a fun sub-plot, called let's see who actually rides and who doesn't. One who definitely doesn't is Terry. Hey I don't care who hears me, I had fun watching this movie, you will to. It requires absolutely no concentration and it is loads of fun if you forget how bad the the plot and acting is and concentrate on how great the biking is!