One of the worst moto movies ever made was Sidewinder One starring Hollywood legend Marjoe Gortner.
I've got a copy of it on VHS somewhere in the mancave....I must dig it out. The real star of the flick is the trick blue Maico title bike. I always had a fantasy of building a replica of it but here's the real deal....
Marjoe's Maico
(2/28/2011)
"Blasting across the back country of motocross -- raising hell with their hot machines and foxy women!"
So proclaimed the promotional poster for the 1977 movie "Sidewinder 1," starring Michael Parks as J.W. Wyatt (is this a rip from 'Easy Rider?') and Marjoe Gortner as Digger.
Hugh Marjoe Ross Gortner, born in Long Beach, California in 1944 to a couple of itinerant preachers, earned national fame at the age of four as a child evangelist and the world's youngest ordained minister. Marjoe, whose curious name is a combination of Mary and Joseph, later became disenchanted with evangelism for profit and participated in a documentary that exposed his parents as fakes and child-abusers who would practice something akin to waterboarding to make him behave.
As an adult, Gortner tried his hand at acting for television and in motion pictures. His filmography includes three motorcycle movies: "Pray for the Wildcats (1974)," "Viva Knievel (1977)," and "Sidewinder 1 (1977)." In "Sidewinder 1," Gortner plays beside Michael Parks of "Then Came Bronson" fame as motocross racers. For a brief review of the movie, click here.
In the film, Gortner and Parks ride Maicos. These were not just prop motorcycles made up to look good on the screen. They were 1976 440cc Wheelsmith Maicos, which were state-of-the-art racers, featuring cast wheels and disc brakes both front and rear. After filming ended, Gortner's motorcycle --numbered 78 (Parks rode #77) -- ended up with Hollywood stunt coordinator Gary Davis. From 2007 to 2010, it appeared in the "MotoStars" exhibit at the Motorcycle Hall of Fame Museum. That's where vintage motocrosser Jay Wilson (pictured right) of White Marsh, Maryland saw it, and decided he had to have it.
After the MotoStars exhibit closed, Wilson contacted Davis, who agreed to sell the machine. With the motorcycle came Gortner's complete costume from the movie, including his racing jersey, 1976 Bell Motostar helmet, ABC leather pants and chest protector, and yellow Heckel boots. The motorcycle was complete and intact, but required a lot of work to be returned to racing condition. Wilson relates, "I probably put a hundred hours into this motorcycle." He elaborates, "The rear brake caliper was entirely frozen, and they don't make them anymore. I took it off the bike, and had a machinist duplicate it, working from a go-kart brake."
On February 27, Wilson celebrated the resurrection of Marjoe's Maico by riding it in competition at an AHRMA vintage race at Gatorback Park near Gainesville, Florida. As luck would have it, a link between the rear brake pedal and the hydraulic master cylinder broke, and Wilson had to pull off after two laps. Standing next to the bike, in all of Gortner's racing gear, Wilson said, "I'm not disappointed. It was my goal to run it in vintage competition, and that's what I did." The Sidewinder lives!
