Bozeman Magazine

The Rider stars real-life saddle bronc rider and breakout actor Brady Jandreau as a once rising star of the rodeo circuit, warned that his competition days are over after a tragic riding accident. As directed by Chloe Zhao, a young filmmaker who hails from Beijing, the achievements of The Rider are staggering, including the discovery and casting of the then 20-year old Jandreau and his family members, all Lakota-Sioux of the Pine Ridge Reservation. Shot by the brilliant cinematographer James Joshua Richards, Zhao gives the badlands of South Dakota a rich sense of place, its landscapes and its long-standing culture of "cowboy Indian" bolstered by the terrific performances from members of Brady's family and the South Dakota Sioux community. One scene, in which the character breaks a horse, features Jandreau actually taming the animal in real time. Based loosely on Jandreau's own story of going from a rodeo up-and-comer to an injured cowboy without a cause (and a need for catharsis), the film is an incredible, powerful reimagining of the mythology of the American West, as remarkable as it is promising. Writes the Boston Globe, "The Rider achieves what cinema is capable of at its best: It reproduces a world with such acuteness, fidelity, and empathy that it transcends the mundane and touches on the universal." Rated R, the film runs 104 minutes. Closed captioning available.