The motorcycle diaries of a topolect cinema

Abstract

Autumn 1965: Steve McQueen travelled to Taiwan. On a brisk autumn day in 1965, the crew of The Sand Pebbles (Robert Wise, 1966), a 20th Century Fox high-budget production, travelled to Taiwan for what was originally scheduled to be a few weeks’ stay. Thanks to inclement weather and other miscellaneous factors, the crew ended up stranded on the island for more than four months. During this period of idleness, the film’s star Steve McQueen could be spotted roaming the Taipei streets on his motorcycle. Besides reporting on the shooting delays, newspapers and magazines included features on McQueen as an amateur motorcyclist, enjoying the pursuit of speed in and around the capital city. Having previously performed a spectacular stunt in a motorcycle chase-and-jump scene in The Great Escape (John Sturges, 1963), McQueen had already earned a reputation as an adventurous, free-spirited biker, and would go on to reprise that image in On Any Sunday (Bruce Brown, 1971), a documentary about the sport of motorcycling and some of its famous racers. The press coverage in Taiwan recreated that persona, lauding the actor variously as a dare-devil rider of impeccable skill, a helpless motorcycle addict, and a rebel with a mania for speed.1 It was also reported that on receiving a Suzuki T20 racer bike, a world-champion motorcycle custom-made for him by the Japanese company, McQueen planned to mount this new vehicle and perform stunts for the local audience, in return for their affectionate attention.2