MOVIE REVIEW : They Were Born to Ride

Alice Stone’s “She Lives to Ride” is a sheer delight, introducing us to several very different female motorcyclists as it casually shatters stereotypes right and left. This is feminism with such a good sense of humor that it suggests unlimited possibilities for women way beyond riding motorcycles. In turn, these female motorcyclists’ sense of humor has gone a long way toward their winning acceptance by notoriously macho male bikers.

All of them are highly successful, highly articulate individuals who have lots more to say than simply to extol the pleasures of driving--rather than merely riding--motorcycles. Without a doubt, the film’s star is 82-year-old Dot Robinson, a vibrant, attractive Florida great-grandmother with a pink Harley and lots of stories about her experiences as a pioneering female motorcyclist who fought for--and won--her right to compete with men in riding contests way back in the ‘30s.

Handsome, statuesque Jo Giovannoni founded a magazine, Harley Women, because motorcycle magines are so male-oriented, only to have to fight to have it placed in racks with those very magazines because it was automatically assumed to be a cheesecake publication. She also tells us that female motorcyclists must learn to be their own mechanics: Nobody stops to help a woman stranded with a bike because everyone assumes that they’re with a man who’s gone for help.

Becky Brown admits she founded the Women in the Wind riding club because she didn’t want to belong to an organization that might give her a “dykes on bikes” image. Then there’s Jacqui Sturgess, a Manhattan advertising executive who belongs to the Sirens, a club that has led the New York City Gay and Lesbian Pride Parade since 1986, and says it’s important for lesbians to have a higher profile than they do. Just as Giovannoni takes us to a South Dakota bikers’ rally that attracts some 200,000 people, florist Amy Berry introduces us to a large convention of African American bikers.

Indeed, that a lone young black woman managed to motorcycle through the rigidly segregated pre-World War II South is just one of the fascinating nuggets of information that Stone, a filmmaker with a graceful, self-effacing style, unearths and presents in deft framing sequences crammed with archival images and clips.

* Unrated. Times guidelines: The film is suitable for all ages.

‘She Lives to Ride’

An Independent Television Service presentation of a Filkela Films production. Producer-director-editor Alice Stone. Narration written by associate producer Diane Hendrix. Cinematographer Maryse Alberti. Music Mason Daring. Running time: one hour, 11 minutes.