Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper play Wyatt and Billy, two long-haired bikers who complete a cocaine deal in Los Angeles and use the proceeds to ride their choppers across the American Southwest toward Mardi Gras, encountering communes, small-town hostility, and a boozy civil-rights lawyer played by Jack Nicholson along the way. Hopper's directorial debut, made on a tiny budget with a rock soundtrack featuring Steppenwolf and The Byrds, became an era-defining sensation that captured the counterculture's optimism curdling into disillusionment and violence. Nicholson's breakout supporting performance earned him his first Oscar nomination and launched his stardom. 'Easy Rider' is widely credited with helping trigger the New Hollywood movement, proving low-budget, director-driven films could be both artistically daring and commercially successful.