Bikes and Bicycling in the Movies Quiz

Answer: A son tries to help his father recover a stolen bicycle.

The harrowing 1948 Vittorio de Sica film, about the desperate attempts by an impoverished father and his son to recover a bicycle that he must have in order to earn money, is routinely listed among the world's most admired and influential films. Several movies are inspired by it or make direct reference to it, including the 2001 Chinese film "Beijing Bicycle", the 2004 Angolan film "O Heroi", and the 1989 parody "The Icicle Thief".

Answer: Joseph Gordon-Levitt

Joseph Gordon-Levitt, whose breakout role was as the youngest-appearing alien in "Third Rock From the Sun", appears as an adult in numerous films including "Inception" and "The Dark Knight Rises". This film pits a bike messenger against a corrupt cop in a plot involving smuggled Chinese aliens on the streets of Manhattan.

Answer: Quicksilver

Kevin Bacon played Jack Casey, the trader-turned-courier; the story follows him as he tries to rebuild his beaten-down self esteem on a bike in traffic. Laurence Fishburne also appears in the film. Quicksilver is another name for Mercury, the Roman god of messengers, which suggests that writer/director Thomas Michael Donnelly is somewhat knowledgeable about San Francisco bicycle messengers, who used to publish a community 'zine called "Mercury Rising".

Answer: Postman

Tati's long-legged postman, who wears his iconic postal uniform throughout the film, gets all fired up with enthusiasm when he sees a newsreel about the modern marvels of the US Postal Service and attempts to emulate its glamorous example in this very funny and touching French film of 1949.

Answer: It was completely filmed in black and white.

The film was nominated for Best Animated Feature, as well as for Best Song, for "Belleville Rendezvous" by Benoît Charest and Sylvain Chomet, a 1920's Jazz-flavoured song that is a hit for the imaginary "Triplets of Belleville", a vocal trio who help the grandmother and her dog Bruno locate the missing racer.

The film owes much of its personality to the work of French comic filmmaker Jacques Tati, especially its low-key humour and the fact that the few lines that are spoken are inconsequential; like his films, it is virtually a silent movie.

Answer: Bloomington, Indiana

The local detail and the specific look of Bloomington (of which we see a lot, since the main character spends many scenes bicycling around the area) add a lot to the texture of the story. For instance, there is a scene where Dennis Christopher as the would-be bike racer and his townie friends played by Dennis Quaid, Daniel Stern and Jackie Earle Haley go swimming in a flooded quarry.

This underlines the plot point that their families are local cutters, who work in the stone quarries, and therefore looked down upon by the transient population of university students.

Answer: Bright red

The beloved stolen bicycle also has white and chrome accents. Pee-wee (Paul Reubens) tracks it across Texas and California in this 1985 film, which was the first full-length film for director Tim Burton.

Answer: E.T., the Extra-Terrestrial

"E.T." doesn't have a lot of bicycle content, but the scene in which Elliott (Henry Thomas) tries to help E.T. escape from government scientists on his flying bike is memorable. This film was the breakout part for a very young Drew Barrymore (though not her first movie role).

Answer: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

Newman (as Butch Cassidy) then performs a series of bike tricks for Ross (as Etta Place), which end abruptly when he crashes backwards trough a split rail fence. At the end of the sequence, the couple is forced to use the same bicycle to flee a disgruntled-looking bull.

The scene is merely a whimsical anecdote in a much larger story of two notorious train robbers, best friends who both love the same woman, forced to flee an implacable lawman determined to hunt them down.

Answer: Elvira Gulch

Margaret Hamilton played both the Wicked Witch and Miss Gulch, who wants to have Toto "put down" because she claims he has bitten her on the leg. Luckily, Toto escapes from the basket long before she has delivered him to the sheriff. Her name is mentioned by Dorothy's Uncle Henry and Auntie Em in the first scene of the movie at Dorothy's home in Kansas.