The Rider (2018): Fractured Dreams on the Endless Plains

In the shadow of South Dakota’s Badlands, a cowboy’s unyielding spirit collides with the brutal reality of a broken body and fading dreams.

The vast, unforgiving landscapes of the American West have long served as a canvas for stories of grit, glory, and heartbreak. The Rider captures this essence in a raw, intimate portrait that feels both timeless and urgently contemporary, blending documentary realism with poetic fiction to explore the life of a young Lakota Sioux rodeo rider grappling with irreversible injury.

  • A semi-autobiographical tale rooted in real tragedy, showcasing non-professional actors in roles mirroring their own lives for unparalleled authenticity.
  • Chloé Zhao’s masterful direction weaves themes of identity, masculinity, and cultural resilience against the backdrop of modern Native American life on the reservation.
  • A meditation on the rodeo subculture’s allure and peril, echoing classic Western myths while confronting their contemporary fractures.

Buckled Broncs and Boundless Horizons

The film opens on the endless prairies of South Dakota, where Brady Jandreau rises before dawn, his world defined by the rhythm of ranch work and the thunder of rodeo arenas. As a skilled bronc rider, Brady embodies the archetype of the modern cowboy: lean, laconic, with a quiet intensity that commands respect from his peers. His days blur between taming wild horses, training his own mounts, and chasing the adrenaline rush of competition. Yet beneath this facade lies a vulnerability exposed by a freak accident during a rodeo event, leaving him with a severe head injury that doctors warn could prove fatal if he mounts again.

Director Chloé Zhao constructs this world with a verité style, employing long takes and natural light to immerse viewers in the tactile realities of reservation life. Horses are not mere props but central characters, their muscles rippling under dusty coats as Brady bonds with them through gentle coaxing and unyielding patience. The rodeo sequences pulse with visceral energy: the explosive eight-second rides, the crowd’s roar, the sharp crack of hooves on dirt. These moments hark back to the golden age of Western cinema, evoking the mythic heroism of John Wayne’s characters, but Zhao strips away the glamour, revealing the physical toll and fleeting triumphs.

Brady’s family anchors the narrative’s emotional core. His father, Tim, a weathered ex-rodeo man living in a trailer, embodies stoic endurance laced with quiet regret. Sister Lilah, neurodivergent and fiercely loyal, communicates through song and unwavering devotion, her presence a reminder of the fragile bonds holding their world together. Their home, a modest ranch amid scrubland, becomes a microcosm of broader struggles: economic hardship, cultural displacement, and the tension between tradition and survival. Zhao films these interactions with handheld intimacy, capturing unscripted glances and half-spoken truths that resonate like echoes from forgotten frontier tales.

The Fall That Shattered Illusions

The pivotal rodeo accident unfolds in fragmented flashbacks, a horse bucking wildly before slamming Brady’s skull against the arena wall. He awakens in a hospital bed, skull fractured, seizures lurking, his identity as a rider hanging by a thread. Doctors issue stark prohibitions: no more riding, lest a second injury end his life. This moment marks the film’s central conflict, thrusting Brady into a limbo between his past prowess and an uncertain future. Zhao draws from real events in Jandreau’s life, blurring lines between performance and reality to heighten the stakes.

Rehabilitation scenes unfold with painful realism. Brady’s hand trembles as he grips a rein, his body betraying the commands of his will. Friends urge him toward safer paths—training horses for others, perhaps drifting into rodeo clown work—but the pull of the saddle proves magnetic. A clandestine ride on a friend’s bucking horse tests his limits, the camera circling in tense anticipation, sweat beading on his brow. These sequences probe the psychology of addiction to risk, mirroring the gambler’s ruin in classic oaters like The Searchers, yet grounded in neuroscientific aftermath rather than heroic recovery.

Cultural layers deepen the personal drama. As a Lakota man, Brady navigates the reservation’s dual heritage: the spiritual connection to horses inherited from Plains tribes and the rodeo circuit’s adopted white cowboy ethos. Powwows and family gatherings intercut with arena footage, highlighting tensions between ancestral pride and assimilated ambition. Zhao, an outsider to this world, earns trust through months of immersion, allowing the film to breathe with authentic rhythms—from the lowing of cattle at dawn to the crackle of a bonfire under starlit skies.

Masculinity’s Tightrope

At its heart, the film dissects modern masculinity through Brady’s odyssey. The cowboy code demands invincibility, yet injury forces introspection. He flirts with a young woman at a rodeo afterparty, their dance a fleeting promise of normalcy, but his guarded nature prevails. Peers idolize him as “the best there ever was gonna be,” piling pressure to reclaim glory. Zhao contrasts this with tender moments: braiding Lilah’s hair, whispering to a skittish colt, revealing a sensitivity at odds with the bravado.

Rodeo culture emerges as a surrogate family, its camaraderie forged in shared peril. Veterans swap yarns of legendary rides, their scarred bodies testaments to devotion. Brady’s internal monologue, voiced in poetic voiceover, wrestles with purpose: “What makes a man: his skill, his heart, or something deeper?” This philosophical undercurrent elevates the film beyond genre, inviting comparisons to Terrence Malick’s meditative landscapes, where nature mirrors human frailty.

Production ingenuity amplifies impact. Shot over a year with Jandreau’s real circle—his father Tim, sister Lilah, best friend Lane—performers inhabit heightened versions of themselves. Actual rodeos provide backdrop, risks minimized but tension real. Zhao’s script, co-written with Jandreau, evolves organically, fostering improvisation that yields raw dialogue. Sound design layers wind-whipped plains with horse snorts and distant thunder, immersing audiences in sensory isolation.

Echoes of the Western Myth

The Rider reimagines the Western genre for the 21st century, subverting tropes while honoring their allure. Classic films romanticized the frontier as boundless opportunity; here, it’s a trap of poverty and faded dreams. Brady’s journey parallels Billy Jack or Dead Man‘s outsiders, but Zhao infuses hope amid despair—small victories like gentling a rogue mustang symbolizing resilience. Critics hailed its Cannes premiere for bridging indie authenticity with epic scope.

Legacy ripples through cinema and culture. Zhao’s approach influenced subsequent works, proving non-actors’ power in narrative film. For collectors of Western memorabilia, it revives interest in rodeo ephemera: silver spurs, fringed chaps, championship buckles evoking eras when Gene Autry ruled silver screens. Modern revivals, like streaming restorations of Lone Star, find kinship in its unflinching gaze.

Challenges marked production: Zhao’s persistence secured Jandreau’s participation post-injury, filming amid recovery. Marketing positioned it as prestige indie, earning Sundance raves and Oscar nods for editing. Its quiet power lies in restraint—no histrionics, just life’s inexorable pull, much like the horizon Brady chases.

Director in the Spotlight: Chloé Zhao

Chloé Zhao, born Zhao Ting in Beijing, China, in 1982, emerged as one of cinema’s most distinctive voices through her fusion of documentary realism and lyrical storytelling. Raised in a bilingual, multicultural environment—her mother an entertainment executive, her stepfather a property developer—Zhao moved to the UK at 15, then to the US, attending Mount Holyoke College before earning an MFA in film production from New York University Tisch School of the Arts in 2010. Her early influences spanned Wong Kar-wai’s romanticism, Terrence Malick’s naturalism, and the French New Wave’s spontaneity, shaping her preference for location shooting and non-professional casts.

Zhao’s feature debut, Songs My Brothers Taught Me (2015), premiered at Sundance, chronicling Lakota youth on the Pine Ridge Reservation and establishing her affinity for Native American stories. This led directly to The Rider (2018), which screened at Cannes Directors’ Fortnight, won the Art Cinema Award, and garnered Gotham and National Board of Review accolades. Her ascent peaked with Nomadland (2020), securing Best Director and Best Picture Oscars, making her the second woman and first woman of color to win the former. Eternals (2021) marked her Hollywood entry, directing the Marvel epic with a focus on emotional depth amid spectacle.

Subsequent projects include The Knives Out sequel Wake Up Dead Man (forthcoming), showcasing her versatility. Zhao’s career highlights encompass Tribeca and Locarno honors, a MacArthur Genius Grant in 2022, and advocacy for diverse representation. Her filmography reflects thematic consistency: transience, identity, and human-nature bonds. Key works include short films like Keem (2010) on Mongolian nomads; Ruins of the Empire (2011), a meditative portrait; and collaborations such as producing Happiest Season (2020). With a production company, Boxwood Films, she champions underrepresented voices, cementing her as a bridge between indie intimacy and global cinema.

Actor in the Spotlight: Brady Jandreau

Brady Jandreau, born in 1992 on the Rosebud Sioux Reservation in South Dakota, embodies the authentic cowboy spirit that defines The Rider. Raised amid horses and rodeos, he honed skills from childhood, competing professionally by his teens in bronc riding and horse training. A viral horse-whispering video caught Zhao’s eye post his 2016 arena accident—a horse fell on him, fracturing his skull and severing nerves—prompting his starring role in a semi-autobiographical tale filmed during recovery.

Jandreau’s performance, raw and unmannered, earned praise for its veracity, blending his real charisma with vulnerable nuance. Post-film, he resumed selective riding, founding Brady Jandreau Ranch for training and clinics, authoring A Cowboy’s Story (2020) on his journey. Appearances include documentaries like Never Quit: The Brad Jandreau Story (2020) and rodeo circuits, where he inspires with resilience talks. No formal awards yet, but his cultural impact endures through TEDx-style speeches on perseverance and Native youth mentorship.

His “filmography” spans real-life rodeo wins in PRCA events (2010s), TV spots on Ride On (2019), and cameos in Western shorts. Collaborations with Zhao extended to Nomadland consultations. Jandreau’s trajectory—from injured rider to symbol of grit—mirrors his onscreen arc, influencing contemporary cowboy narratives in media like Yellowstone. Active on social platforms sharing ranch life, he fosters community, his story a beacon for dreamers facing adversity.

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Bibliography

Bradshaw, P. (2018) The Rider review. The Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/may/14/the-rider-review-chloe-zhao-brady-jandreau (Accessed 15 October 2023).

Chang, J. (2018) Cannes film festival: The Rider. Variety. Available at: https://variety.com/2018/film/reviews/the-rider-review-chloe-zhao-1202806789/ (Accessed 15 October 2023).

Erickson, H. (2021) Chloé Zhao: A director profile. Sight and Sound, British Film Institute.

Jandreau, B. (2020) A Cowboy’s Story: The Brady Jandreau Journey. Self-published.

Scott, A.O. (2018) Review: In ‘The Rider,’ a cowboy confronts his limits. New York Times. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/05/movies/the-rider-review.html (Accessed 15 October 2023).

Zhao, C. (2019) Interview: Directing The Rider. IndieWire. Available at: https://www.indiewire.com/2019/02/chloe-zhao-the-rider-interview-1202046382/ (Accessed 15 October 2023).

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