James Peterson tells the story of riding his bike fifty miles to see his girlfriend, getting dumped, and riding home. Jazz drummer Dave King (The Bad Plus) improvises to this story. Tom Schroeder in turn draws animation to an analysis of both audio tracks. Here is the record of their free-associative collaboration.
“ . . . is pretty wonderful. Using Thurber-like pen and ink, Schroeder illustrates the real-life audio testimony of a lovesick fool who rode his bike for five hours to visit a woman he thought loved him back. Drawn in thick, sensuously rounded white lines set against a black background, this is the most inventive seven minutes of film in many a moon.”
-Chuck Wilson, LA Weekly, May 4, 2001.
“Tom Schroeder charms with his simple white-on-black line animation Bike Ride (US, 2000), . . .. This heartbreaking tale is told with the lightest touch: time, it turns out, can heal all wounds – as we hear in the narrator/protagonist’s voice, and see in the loose, laughing drawings.
-Chris Gehman, Cinemascope, Winter 2002
“. . . Schroeder spent over a year drawing the 4,138 pictures that make up the film, from first to last, he says, without knowing ahead of time what he was going to draw. The result is Bike Ride, a seven-minute short that might just make Schroeder the only maestro of narrative animation we have in the Twin Cities. It’s stream of consciousness imagery takes unexpected turns, but always stays loosely tethered to Peterson’s comically heart-breaking story. Independent filmmakers are constantly trying to achieve that perfect balance of virtuosity and low-tech charm, and Schroeder has gotten it thanks to his intelligent conception . . .”
-Charles Bowe, Pulse, May 2, 2001.
“ . . . the film itself is consummately professional. “Bike Ride,” . . . represents a playful yet precise integration of spoken word, music, and line drawing for the motion picture. Working in the tradition of Norman McLaren and George Griffin, who improvised animation to the jazz recordings of Oscar Peterson and Charlie Parker, respectively, Schroeder drew the 4,138 pictures that would simultaneously advance the narrative and illustrate its dynamic range in metaphor. Experimental it is – but who couldn’t relate?”
-Rob Nelson, City Pages, April 25, 2001.
Simple, clean white lines over black paper smoothly illustrate a rambling story told in voice over, something akin to what you’d get out of your buddy after a few beers. It’s simple. It’s funny. It’s beautiful. The same set of lines keep flowing from one illustration to another, and somehow the film never manages to hit a wrong note. Remember Tom Schroeder.
-Space Toast Page, Fall 2002.
“This entertaining and wonderfully low-key film . . . is very reminiscent of McLaren, and other notable mid-century figures such as Saul Bass.”
-Jon Hofferman, Animation World Network
Tom Schroeder’s Bike Ride is unique that all three elements—image, words, and sound—are equally significant. The whole film animation is composed of the responses to each part of its production. The director is inspired by the story which the voice actor tells, and the composer creates a sound in response to the animation director has created. It is like watching a conversation of three. This film is an example of a successful film that is composed of a conversation between time, light, and sound.
-Agniezcka Woznicka, Rhode Island School of Art and Design
How far would you ride your bike to visit a girl who may or may not want to see you? Tom Schroeder's adorable and funny animated 2000 short Bike Ride tells the seemingly simple tale of a man’s 50-mile bike journey to pay a surprise visit to his girlfriend. Schroeder’s line drawings illustrate both James Petersen’s freewheeling narration and Dave King’s improvised jazz soundtrack. The result is a dreamlike, dizzying head trip.
-Bilge Ebiri, New York Magazine
“I was thinking about your animated film and the drum rhythm that you had as a background for the young man biking that you showed me and I guess that I thought you had done a heck of a job coordinating the sounds, the rhythm of those drums along with the rhythm of the bike in its animated form. It was only on riding a bike myself and getting that rhythm that I realized how closely you had matched those two and what a terrific job that was. It tickled me. I kind of giggled about it for half of my bike ride that day.
-John de Rossier, commodities trader / actor