Vroom aww

June 4, 2014 7:37 AM

My Mom's Motorcycle "This is a short film about how my mom became the owner of a motorcycle ... more deeply it is about how people use objects to connect with times, ideas, and people."
posted by pwally (9 comments total)

Not what I expected! Liked it.
posted by curious nu at 7:43 AM on June 4, 2014

Helmetless motorcycle riders make me more nervous than horror movie music.
posted by etc. at 7:58 AM on June 4, 2014 [4 favorites]

Very Wes Anderson. Very good.
posted by DanCall at 8:54 AM on June 4, 2014

Mod note: Comment removed, let's maybe skip veering off into how terrible the youtube comments are. The youtube comments are always terrible.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:39 AM on June 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

There are moments when it's really interesting, but then it goes on to demonstrate just what's wrong with the hipster ethos. Shaving with a double-edged razor isn't capturing a lost time when things were important (though I like to shave that way myself). The things he shows weren't just symbols to the people who collected them, they were tools collected because they might be useful. While shaving doesn't capture that ethos, working on the motorcycle would. How about a new lens for the left-front turn signal as a start? You wouldn't want your Mom riding an unsafe machine, would you?
posted by sfred at 10:15 AM on June 4, 2014

This was interesting: "People need real things. They need to connect with reality. I grew up in a time that was filled with fake realities. My grandfathers grew up in a time that seemed more authentic, and I wanted a piece of it."

My teenager sent me this link yesterday, and I just got around to looking at it. I look forward to discussing it with him. "Connecting to times, ideas, and people..." indeed. I wonder if he'll want to learn more about his grandparents' lives and the things they did.

I think Mr. Gautraud is a little hard on himself, though, when he says of his grandfathers: "I love and respected them because of what they gave to others... I was concerned with having something, and they were concerned with giving something."

I suspect his grandfathers may have been the same as he was, in their youth, and came to focus on giving as they matured and started families.

Good story, well told.
posted by evilmomlady at 10:28 AM on June 4, 2014

Or maybe he's just telling me I need a motorcycle.
posted by evilmomlady at 10:29 AM on June 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

> The things he shows weren't just symbols to the people who collected them, they were tools collected because they might be useful. While shaving doesn't capture that ethos, working on the motorcycle would.

Yup. Working on things gives you a deeper level of understanding*, and a deeper level of ownership.
And the motorcycle is, itself, a tool and deserves to be used as such. Maybe his mother would actually enjoy riding it... it saddens me to think that that cute little bike was sold just to keep it from being ridden.
Ride that bike to a place where you've never been, and depend on it for getting home in one piece, or at all, while the bike depends on you for getting fueled up and maintained... get away from everything familiar and from places where money can solve problems, and see how important that bike is then.

Life is not about having stuff. It's about doing stuff.

Then again, if he really rode it dressed like that (even with that helmet, which doesn't look like it's worth much) then HE is the tool.

Nevertheless, nice little film, nice guy. Has a few things to learn. But he probably will.

* of those things, and of yourself
posted by Too-Ticky at 11:19 AM on June 4, 2014

Looks like he didn't take that giving thing to heart, haggling another $50 off his own mother.
posted by Grumpy old geek at 3:21 PM on June 4, 2014 [2 favorites]