Tags archives: Lane Scott
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6 years ago
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The story of how Chloé Zhao’s The Rider came to be is as intriguing as the movie itself. While filming her first feature, Songs My Brothers Taught Me, on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota, Zhao befriended some of its Oglala Lakota residents. Born and raised on the reservation, they are both Native American and genuine cowboys, as pure a distillation (and contradiction) of Americana as exists.
One charismatic young cowboy, Brady Jandreau, a horse trainer and rising rodeo star, particularly impressed Zhao. She wanted to feature him in her next film, but couldn’t think of a story line. In April 2016, fate tragically intervened when Jandreau was thrown off his horse while competing in a rodeo in Fargo, North Dakota. The horse nearly crushed his skull, necessitating surgery and a metal plate, followed by extensive rehab. When Zhao learned that Jandreau was back training horses just weeks after his accident, she knew she had her movie. Essentially a docu-drama, The Rider is an authentic and poetic film about a young man struggling to hold on to his identity.
The film has an immediate sense of place, as Zhao makes good use of Pine Ridge and the gorgeous, wide-open South Dakota prairie. Adding to the movie's authenticity is the cast, all playing versions of themselves. Aside from Jandreau himself (here named Brady Blackburn), his father Tim and sister Lilly have starring roles, as does former rodeo champ Lane Scott, shown recuperating from his own career[...]
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