Long Way Round

This movie has been my obsession for the last week. I think about it when I'm awake, when I sleep, I replay the scenes in my dreams. I want to watch it over again, even though it's about 6 hours long and I just finished watching it Monday. I don't know why it's stuck in my head.

Long Way Round is the DVD of the television series documenting the 2004 trip Ewan McGreggor and Charley Boorman took around the world on their motorcycles. My dad had watched it and gave it to me to watch. I'd seen some other around-the-world-motorcycle-trip movies, like Mondo Enduro, and I just wasn't impressed. Yes it's hard and completely crazy to attempt to go around the world on your motorcycle. Big deal. But this movie is different. It's not so much the trip, although that was truly exciting and beautiful and all, but the friendship between Ewan and Charley is just so much fun to watch. They're total screwballs and even waist-deep in a river, pushing their bikes across through the current, they're laughing. They made fun out of everything they did and I loved that.

As an added bonus, Ewan and Charley both have great accents and use those British phrases I love so much. They visited "petrol stations" and got mosquito bites on their "bums". They stood in "queues" and wanted to film their trip so they might "have a bit of a giggle" later on in life watching the film with their grandkids. At one point Ewan called himself something that I really want to go back and find because I intend to use it some day. Something like "whiney Molly arsehole". I love it!

I feel about this DVD the way I did during the first couple of seasons of 'The Real World'. I was obsessed with that show because it showed real people being real and having fun together. They may have fought a little, but they had more fun than fights. It was reality TV at it's best and that's exactly what Long Way Round is.

I've read some complaints about the movie with people saying that Ewan and Charley are whiney spoiled brats and how some people couldn't get through the first hour of the DVD. The first hour tells the story of how this idea came to be and who got involved and how they managed to organize the whole adventure. I had even said to Luke during one of those early scenes when they're upset because KTM refuses to give them three bikes for the trip, "they're rich - can't they buy their own bikes?" After watching the whole movie, I see why they couldn't just buy their own bikes. Why they needed donations and sponsors. This wasn't just two spoiled brats going on "holiday". They were making a movie. They had camera crews and producers, equipment and insurance, doctors who traveled with them and a whole support team. They needed backing to be able to create such a great DVD. If you watch it, don't be put of in the beginning, it's worth the time to see how it was all planned.

Even if you don't ride a motorcycle or have any plans to ever travel around the world, I would still recommend this movie to everyone. It's a great time watching two fantastic friends have one incredible adventure. Go now and rent it. Or come to my house, I'd be more than happy to watch it again!