DVD's and books: Life Cycles

What to do, what to do. The other day I decided to torture myself by watching a bike movie, Life Cycles. The first time I watched it was back in the winter, and at that time, I had no idea what to expect. The cover has a weird artsy-fartsy picture and the description on the back cover states "it tells a spectacular story of the bike, from its creation to its eventual demise."  Hmmm, sounds a little pretentious to me. Well, lets pop it in and have a look. The opening scenes are shot in the Devinci factory and give a first hand visual account of a bike being built. It then segways to scenes of downtown Vancouver, and then the action eventually makes its way to some trail riding. Now the riding is pretty cool to watch, but it's the cinematography that makes this a must see movie. It's hard to do this movie any justice in a little written blurb, and since I don't consider myself to be a movie reviewer in any capacity, anything I say won't shed light on how amazing this movie is.
You really do have to see it to believe it. The camera angles, the time lapses used, everything in this movie makes you say "Wow". The riding covers the trail to freeriding end of the mountain bike spectrum, but even skinny shaved leg dude (like myself) can appreciate the balls it takes to pull of the airs, tricks and speed of the riding in the movie.
The only downside of the movie is the length, about 45 minutes...I wanted to see more riding. But the bonus features, which show how the movie was made make up for the short length.

Also, as I've been bumming around the house, and killing time online, I was checking out Competitive Cyclist, and I ended up ordering some books. They were all on sale, so I decided why the hell not. It was such a good deal that I couldn't pass it up. They are Le Metier by Michael Barry, The Rouleur 2010 photo annual, and The Peloton by Timm Kolln.

I'm most eager to check out the book by Timm Kolln. The premise behind the book is pretty cool. Over the course of three years, Kolln took portraits of pro riders immediately following races. As you can imagine (and see on The Rouleur website), there are some pretty ragged looking pros after racing hundreds of kilometres. After the pics were taken, Kolln presented them to the riders (usually months later), and then had them write a narrative to accompany the photo. Reviews will eventually come once I have the books in my hands.