American Graffiti (1973, George Lucas)
American Graffiti takes place in California in 1962, and one thing is immediately striking: the innocence. This was before the JFK assassination, while the young were still naive and the music was still sweet. The movie centers on four teenage boys, and takes place in one night. They have graduated highschool, and the next morning some of them are leaving for college.
There’s Curt (Richard Dreyfuss), a rather mature young man who nevertheless has doubts about leaving the comfort of his home town for the big and scary real world. Then there’s Steve (Ron Howard), who is dating Curt’s sister Laurie (Cindy Williams). Steve is excited at the prospect of finally breaking free, and even suggests to his girlfriend that they should see other people while he’s away.
Their friend Terry “The Toad” (an impossibly young Charles Martin Smith) is your typical nerd. He gets to take care of Steve’s car, and he meets a girl while cruising around town. Speaking of cruising, the last of the four is John Milner (Paul LeMat). Milner never left after highschool, probably too afraid of change, and instead spends his days racing anyone who’ll take him on (including a guy called Bob Falfa, played by none other than Harrison Ford).
I won’t say much about the goings on, as the enjoyment of the film lies in spending time with these guys and learning about them as they learn a thing or two about themselves. I will say though that I really enjoyed the actors and their characters. It seemed remarkably genuine throughout, as if this was a documentary and not fiction.
I can’t help but wonder what it would have been like to have seen this when it came out in the early 70s. The era of innocence over, the movie plays like a nostalgic milestone of times gone by, reminding us how far we have come since then. The world these young men inhabit simply doesn’t exist any more. Generations have come and gone. Still, this movie will make you long for those days when true happiness could be found in cruising Main Street, picking up girls, hanging out at the diner, and listening to the radio.
I’ve never been a big fan of George Lucas. In fact, I’ve never been any kind of fan of his; I don’t even like the Star Wars movies. This once, however, he somehow got it all exactly right.
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I’m not a huge fan of Star Wars either, or THX 1138 for that matter, but I really liked this one as well. I think he got it right because 1) this is a reality he knew and 2), he wasn’t yet obsessed with making the most. Possible. Money.
If he abandoned the whole Star Wars thing for a while and decided to make another small, personal movie like this, I think I’d be excited.