If you consider yourself a gearhead, the documentary The Engine Inside will feel like a warm embrace from the greater cycling community. However, those who aren’t passionate about the two-wheeled machine may feel a bit like an outsider looking in. Regardless, the film’s niche commercial appeal has a wider universal message that applies to everyone: a bike has the potential to solve global problems and move humanity forward. We just need to be willing to embrace it.
The Engine Inside, directed by Darcy Wittenburg, Colin Jones, and Darren McCullough, is more than just a love letter to the bicycle. It teeters on appearing like a PSA, or a long-form call to action to get audiences to ditch their cars and incorporate more bikes into their daily lives.
This nearly 200-year-old machine is the star of the film, its importance made known from the voiceover narration by a David Attenborough-sounding English gentleman. Throughout the brisk 83 minutes, we are introduced to people from all over the globe whose lives have been greatly affected by a bicycle. Through their vulnerable stories, we come to realize that a bike can be more than a tool or a toy, many consider it a source of therapy and freedom.
It’s clear that this film was made with the purest of intentions and goodwill, and not necessarily for cinematic accolades and awards. That said, at times it lingers on melodramatic moments that distract from the film’s intention of hopefulness. Slow-motion crying about past trauma and claims of feeling “discriminated against” or that “humanity treats people on bikes like punching bags” comes off heavy-handed. No doubt these emotions are valid but perhaps the effect would have been toned down if the documentary didn’t also incorporate a strong dependence on music with lyrics. The film is wall-to-wall music, which can come off as claustrophobic and forced.
The Engine Inside doesn’t necessarily tell the history of the bike, but rather the effects of the bike on people’s lives. Interesting facts are sprinkled throughout, like where the white “ghost bikes” originated from, and how bicycles and cars share the same laws. By the end of the documentary, it is the filmmakers’ goal that audiences consider this alternative way of living. After all, it is the cleanest engine around.
