Dazed and Confused is a 1993 American film
written and directed by Richard Linklater. The movie's large ensemble cast featured a number of future stars.
The film took in no more than $8 million at the U.S. box office, but in recent years has achieved cult film status. Quentin Tarantino included it on his list of the
twelve greatest films of all time in voting in the 2002 Sight and
Sound.[1] It also ranked third on
Entertainment Weekly's list of the 50 Best High School Movies. [2]
The title of the film is derived from the Led Zeppelin song of the same name.[3] Linklater approached members of the band for permission to use some of their songs in the movie but,
although Jimmy Page agreed, Robert Plant
refused.[4]
Plot
The film takes place on May 28, 1976, the last day of school at
Lee High School in Austin, Texas. The seniors are preparing for the annual hazing of incoming
freshmen by building paddles and buying cooking supplies; meanwhile, Randall "Pink" Floyd, the school's star football player, is
asked to sign a school pledge, promising not to take drugs or do anything else that could "jeopardize the goal of a championship
season in '76". When classes end, the freshman boys are hunted down by the senior boys for paddling while the freshman girls are
rounded up in a parking lot, covered in condiments, forced to propose to senior boys, and taken through a carwash. During this
time, freshman Sabrina strikes a chord with senior Tony.
A major evening plan is ruined when Pickford's parents discover that he is planning to host a keg
party that night. Meanwhile, freshman Mitch is violently paddled by the seniors, most of all by O'Bannion, the nastiest
and dumbest of the class. Mitch gets a ride home with Pink, who is shown to be sympathetic and offers to take Mitch riding with
the others that night. Meanwhile, Tony drives around with his friends Cynthia and Mike, who is uncertain about what to do after
high school. Mitch rides with Pink and Wooderson, who graduated years ago but still hangs out with highschoolers.
The three of them stop at the Emporium, a popular pool hall. Mitch is introduced to sophomore Julie, and they seem to be
mutually attracted to each other. Mitch goes driving again with some of the seniors. They play mailbox baseball and pretend to steal beer, but an owner of one of the mailboxes catches them and
threatens them with a gun before they escape. They return to the Emporium, where Mitch meets up with his freshmen friends. They
come up with a plan to get revenge on O'Bannion and dump paint on him in front of everybody else.
A new keg party is planned at one of the Austin Moontowers, which attracts
essentially the entire senior class and several of the freshmen. Mike has a confrontation with toughguy Clint while Tony meets up
with Sabrina again and Cynthia exchanges phone numbers with Wooderson. Ben confronts Pink about his refusal to sign the pledge
but he is still unsure, believing it violates students' privacy and lifestyles. Mike picks a fight with Clint but ends up getting
beaten-up and humiliated. Mitch runs into Julie and they hit it off again, and are later shown making out. Tony offers Sabrina a
ride home, and kisses her when he drops her off at her house.
As night turns to dawn, Pink, Wooderson, Don, Slater, Simone and Shavonne smoke on the school football field, which the police
soon notice. The school football coach is called and tells Pink that his friends are part of a bad crowd. Pink throws the pledge
at the coach and leaves with his friends to get tickets to an Aerosmith concert. Meanwhile,
Mitch arrives home at sunrise but his mother decides to go easy on him. The film ends with Pink and his friends driving on a
highway.
Themes
The film's overarching themes involve angst-ridden teenagers bristling at authority,
coming of age stories and anomie. These themes are played
out in various ways across the film's major characters.
- Mitch and Sabrina are both transitioning from middle school to high school, and transitioning away from their younger groups
of friends to an older, more sophisticated group. Both characters also make their first romantic connections, and both with older
characters.
- Pink resists the pressure from his peers, authority figures and citizens in town and refuses to sign the pledge.
- Cynthia, Tony and Mike have several conversations about where they see themselves going in life.
- Cynthia transitions from a platonic relationship with her male friends to a potential sexual relationship with
Wooderson.
- O'Bannion is accused of failing his senior year of high school specifically so he can prey on and continue to haze younger
high school students.
- Wooderson and Don both have monologues that outline the characters' rejection of the ordinary, adult culture that surrounds
them. Wooderson disparages the idea of pursuing higher education, preferring instead to work a steady job with the city that
provides him the means to continue hanging out with high-schoolers, while Don proclaims that his only goal is to have as much fun
as possible while he is stuck in high school.
- Wooderson also advises Pink that the pledge he is being asked to sign is merely the first of similar accommodations to
authority he will be asked to make throughout his life.
It's notable that the film's release coincided with the rising popularity of grunge
music, which was significantly influenced by late 70s rock featured in the film, and the popular notion of teenagers in the
seventies as a "lost generation." The film offered up comparisons and contrasts between
slacker culture in the early 90s and late 70s culture.
Reception
When the film was first released on September 24th, 1993, it was not one of the most prominent or talked-about film of the
year, and not many critics were bothered to review it. Indeed, in the years since the film's release, only 42 reviews have been
counted on website Rotten Tomatoes. Still, of those reviews, only one is negative, and
the film has achieved the status of a cult classic over the years. Roger Ebert awarded the
film three stars out of four, praising the film as "art crossed with anthropology" with a
"painful underside."[5]
Dazed and Confused Soundtrack (1993)
Image:Dazedandconfused.jpg
Dazed and Confused 1993 Motion Picture Soundtrack
- Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo - Rick Derringer
- Slow Ride - Foghat
- School's Out - Alice Cooper
- Jim Dandy - Black Oak Arkansas
- Tush - ZZ Top
- Love Hurts - Nazareth
- Stranglehold - Ted Nugent
- Cherry Bomb - The Runaways
- Fox on the Run - Sweet
- Low Rider - War
- Tuesday's Gone - Lynyrd Skynyrd
- Highway Star - Deep Purple
- Rock and Roll All Nite - KISS
- Paranoid - Black Sabbath
Even More Dazed and Confused Soundtrack (1994)
- Free Ride - Edgar Winter Group
- No More Mr. Nice Guy - Alice Cooper
- Livin' In The USA - The Steve Miller Band
- Never Been Any Reason - Head East
- Why Can't We Be Friends? - War
- Summer Breeze - Seals and Crofts
- Right Place, Wrong Time - Dr. John
- Balinese - ZZ Top
- Lord Have Mercy On My Soul - Black Oak Arkansas
- I Just Want To Make Love to You - Foghat
- Show Me The Way - Peter Frampton
- Do You Feel Like We Do? - Peter Frampton
Book
In September of 1993, St. Martin's Press published a 127-page, softcover book (ISBN #0-312-09466-3) that was inspired by the
screenplay by Richard Linklater and compiled by Richard Linklater, Denise Montgomery and others. It was presented as a kind of
yearbook that contained essays written by characters from the film as well as profiles on the characters, a timeline focusing on
the years 1973 to 1977 and various 1970s pop culture charts and quizzes. It also featured dozens of black-and-white photos from
the film. It is said to be based on the happenings at Stephen F. Austin High School in Austin, Texas.
Some of the material contained in the original 1993 book was reprinted in the 72-page book included with the Criterion DVD
release in 2006.
Criterion Collection DVD
A two-disc Criterion Collection boxed-set edition was released on
June 6, 2006, in the USA and Canada only. The set features an audio
commentary by Richard Linklater, deleted scenes, the original trailer, the 50 minute "Making Dazed" documentary that aired on the
American Movie Classics channel on September 18, 2005, on-set interviews,
behind-the-scenes footage, cast auditions and footage from the ten-year anniversary celebration. Also included is a 72-page book
featuring new essays by Kent Jones, Jim DeRogatis, and Chuck Klosterman as well as memories from the cast and crew, character
profiles (as seen in the original 1993 book) and a mini reproduction of the original film poster designed by Frank Kozik.
The film has also been released on HD DVD.
Main cast
Reunions of cast members
- In the movie Empire Records, a Dazed and Confused sticker can be seen
on the cash register. Rory Cochrane appeared in both films.
- Ben Affleck and Joey Lauren Adams would
reunite on screen a number of times in Kevin Smith's movies, including Mallrats, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back,
and Chasing Amy, in the latter of which they both had lead roles. Coincidentally, the
first movie they had roles in, Mallrats, starred Jeremy
London, Jason London's twin brother. Affleck would also reunite with
Nicky Katt in the films Phantoms and
Boiler Room, and with Cole Hauser in
Good Will Hunting, which was written by Affleck.
- Adam Goldberg and Anthony Rapp are once again
cast together in the Academy award winning film, A Beautiful Mind, as colleagues of the main character, John Nash, played by Russell Crowe.
- The pinball machine in the Emporium can also be seen in Richard Linklater's film Waking
Life, which stars Wiley Wiggins; Nicky Katt and Adam Goldberg also appear in the film.
- Nicky Katt and Parker Posey appear in Linklater's
film SubUrbia.
Lawsuit
- In October 2004, three of Linklater's former classmates, whose surnames are Wooderson, Slater, and Floyd, filed a defamation
lawsuit against Linklater, claiming to be the basis for the similarly named characters on the film. The lawsuit was filed in New
Mexico rather than Texas because New Mexico has a longer statute of
limitations[6]
See also
References
External links
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