Every week, Shelf Life sees Tom White select and talk about a movie that lives on his DVD shelf, one he thinks we should all see.
The third film from Richard Linklater, and the second after Slacker put him on the the map, 1993's Dazed and Confused is typical of the director, presented as a slice of life of a group of mostly directionless characters as they go about their daily lives. But this coming of age comedy, with it's ensemble of, at the time, soon to be stars, and an undeniable love for the 1970's, became, pretty much instantly, one of Linklater's most accomplished work.
Like most of the director's work, his home state of Texas is the setting, as the last day of school sees a disparate group of Austin high schoolers looking to celebrate. The plot is as directionless as the characters it follows. They are just looking for a good time, and the wonderful script fizzing with hilarious and endlessly quotable dialogue (if you've ever done a Matthew McConaughey impression, you've quoted Dazed and Confused), delivers just that. It's a refreshingly real portrayal of teenage life, there is no manufactured drama to add high stakes to an otherwise simple story. There are no teenage pregnancies, or sinister drug dealers, to complicate our characters lives. They are real kids, living real lives, where the biggest problem they have to have to face is dealing with the authority of grown ups, where they'll get their next beer, or avoiding the bully who is making their life hell. It's obvious Linklater is looking back on his life with affection, clearly idealising his time as a teenager. But in a way, don't we all do that? Don't we all look back at our time in school, Secondary or High, ignoring all the hard times, and just focusing on the good? This just goes to make the movie feel more real and enjoyable, and while Linklater may have made it as nostalgia for himself, it becomes nostalgia for us as well. No matter what time you grew up in, you can see passed the 70's trappings, and just select and relive your 'glory days' as a teenager.
The wonderful ensemble cast goes a long way to making this movie as great as it is, with the likes of Ben Affleck, Matthew McConaughey, Milla Jonovich, Adam Goldberg, Parker Posey, Cole Hauser, and an uncredited Renée Zellweger just starting out on their careers here. In fact, this is McConaughey's first role, and as Wooderson, a 20-something who still hangs out with high schoolers (face it, this type of guy is someone we've all known at some stage in our lives), he constructed the character, complete with "alright, alright, alright", the public would know him as before his recent McConaug-sance. All the actors play their roles perfectly, from Jason London, being the focus as the star football player being forced to conform, to Affleck as constantly held back knuckle head, who takes far too much pleasure in the schools hazing tradition of paddling the freshmen. The soundtrack also plays a big part here, packing in some of the best songs from the 70's, with the likes of Black Sabbath, Alice Cooper (just guess which song), and ZZ Top along for the ride, well before Guardians of the Galaxy made itself an essential addition of every body's collection.
Understandably, and deservedly, Dazed and Confused has achieved cult status, and also had buckets of acclaim poured onto it by the likes of Entertainment Weekly and Quentin Tarantino. Funny and relateable, Dazed and Confused is a wonderful slice of nostalgia, no matter if you grew up in the 70's or not, that everybody should pop into the DVD player every once in a while, and let the good times wash over them.
