1989’s The ‘Burbs takes place in …. well, it’s right there in the title.
Welcome to the suburbs! It’s place with big houses, green lawns, and neighbors who often don’t have much to do other than watch each other and gossip. Ray Peterson (Tom Hanks) lives with his wife, Carol (Carrie Fisher), and is friends with Art Weingartner (Rick Ducommun) and Mark Rumsfield (Bruce Dern). Ricky Butler (Corey Feldman) is the local teenager. It’s a nice neighborhood …. at least, until the Klopeks move in.
The Klopeks are viewed with suspicion from the minute they show up. They’re from a different country, they always seem to be burying something in their backyard, and Dr. Werner Klopek (Henry Gibson) is oddly stand-offish. When Walter Seznick (Gale Gordon) disappears and the the Klopeks are seen around Walter’s house and with Walter’s dog, Ray and his friends start to suspect that their new neighbors might be ritualistic murderers!
Oh, how I love The ‘Burbs. The film’s portrait of the suburbs as being a hotbed of paranoia may be a familiar one but it doesn’t matter when you’ve got actors like Tom Hanks and Bruce Dern throwing themselves into their roles. As always, Hanks is the glue that holds the film and its disparate parts together, giving a likable performance as a man who goes from being the voice of reason to being convinced that his neighbors are cannibals. Bruce Dern gleefully sends up his own image as a paranoid Vietnam vet but there’s also a sweetness to Dern’s performance that really makes it stand out. Dern’s character might be a little crazy but he does truly care about his neighbors.
Just as he did with Piranha and The Howling, Dante balances humor with suspense. He does such a good job of telling the story and getting good performances from his cast, that even the film’s big twist works far better than one might expect. It’s an 80s film so, of course, a few things explode towards the end of it. The film’s character-based humor is replaced with some broader jokes but no matter. The Burbs is an entertaining trip to the heart of suburban paranoia.
As the saying goes, just because you’re paranoid, that doesn’t mean that they aren’t out to get you.
Released in 2000, Boiler Room tells the story of Seth Davis (Giovanni Ribisi).
Seth is only 19 years old. He’s the son of a federal judge and he’s also a college dropout. Seth is making a pretty good living for himself, running a casino out of a house near the campus. One night, a handsome 20something named Greg Weinstein (Nicky Katt) stops by and tells Seth that he could be making an even better living for himself as a broker at J.T. Marlin.
Located somewhere in Long Island, J.T. Marlin is a brokerage firm that is dominated by loud and young men. Overseen by the ruthless Jim Young (Ben Affleck, doing the glorified cameo thing), J.T. Marlin is a place where everyone owns an expensive car, an expensive watch, and where everyone brags about how much money they’ve made. The insults and slurs fly from desk to desk, as they tend to do whenever a bunch of wealthy, highly competitive guys get together. J.T. is seduced by the atmosphere, even as he watches some broker breaks down due to the pressure. He becomes friends with Chris Varick (Vin Diesel) and falls for receptionist Abbie Halpert (Nia Long), who just happens to be Greg’s ex-girlfriend. Eventually, Seth gets good at his job. Unfortunately, it turns out that his job is centered around tricking people into investing in a pyramid scheme and eventually, one of Seth’s clients, Harry (Taylor Nichols), ends up broke and without his family. The guilt-stricken Seth realizes that he has a conscience.
Like a lot of these type of movies, Boiler Room is at its best when it starts, when it’s all about tough talk, rude jokes, and obsessive competition amongst a bunch of well-dressed good-looking guys. Nicky Katt and Vin Diesel are so much fun to listen to that it’s hard not to regret that the entire film wasn’t just about them. Things become significantly less interesting once the FBI shows up and Seth decides to become a snitch. For the most part, no one like a snitch, even if they’re motivated by the purest of intentions. To make a snitch likable, he has to be a truly compelling character, like Henry Hill in Goodfellas. For the most part, audiences prefer anti-heroes who go down with the ship as opposed to the rats who jump into the first lifeboat they see. In The Wolf of Wall Street, Jordan Belfort agrees to wear a wire but then slips his business partner a note, warning him. That’s one of the reasons why The Wolf of Wall Street is still a classic while Boiler Room has been largely forgotten. As a character, Seth just isn’t compelling enough to pull off the snitch act. Nor does he really seem clever enough to pull off what he does at the end of the film.
That said, I do enjoy Boiler Room. It’s largely due to the cast. Nicky Katt, Vin Diesel, Scott Caan, Giovanni Ribisi, they were all young, energetic, and eager to show off what they could do. While their characters competed to see who could make the most money, the actors competed to see who could steal the most scenes. The film is ultimately only so-so but that cast is unforgettable.
Rest in peace, the great character actor Nicky Katt. The details are still sketchy but it’s being reported that he passed away at the age of 54.
Katt was a child actor who transitioned into adult roles. He appeared in a lot of movies but I’ll always remember him as Clint, the absolutely terrifying bully in 1993’s Dazed and Confused. Here he is, scaring the heck out of poor Adam Goldberg.
(For a while, there were plans for a Dazed and Confused sequel in which Clint reformed and became a respected businessman while Adam Goldberg’s Mike went insane as he continued to obsess on that fight back in 1976.)
Today, the Shattered Lens wishes a happy birthday to one of my favorite character actors, Nicky Katt!
In 1993’s Dazed and Confused, Katt had a small but pivotal role as Clint. Clint is the guy who loves his car, drinking beer, smoking weed, and beating up people. Mike (played by Adam Goldberg) runs afoul of Nick at the end of the year party and later decides that he has no choice but to fight back. Needless to say, Clint is the better fighter of the two but at least Mike got one good punch in!
(For a while, there was talk of a Dazed and Confused sequel, in which Clint would have turned his life around and become both a born again Christian, and a respected member of the community while Mike would still be obsessing about their brief fight in 1976,)
Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1986. Almost the entire show is currently streaming is on Youtube, Daily Motion, and a few other sites.
This week, season 4 begins with …. THE DEVIL!
Episode 4.1 “The Devil and Mandy Breem/The Millionaire”
(Dir by Vince Edwards, originally aired on October 25th, 1980)
The fourth season of Fantasy Island opens with Mr. Roarke and Tattoo once again upset with each other.
When a man named Fred Catlett (Arte Johnson) wrote to Mr. Roarke and said that his fantasy was to become an instant millionaire, Roarke turned down his fantasy for …. reasons, I guess. Seriously, becoming an instant millionaire sounds like a typical fantasy and I seem to remember that it’s one that Roarke has granted for other guests on the series. I’m not sure why Roarke decided that poor, meek Fred Catlett was somehow unworthy of his fantasy.
For whatever reason, though, Roarke does turn down the fantasy. So, imagine his surprise when Fred shows up on the island! Tattoo explains that he decided to give Fred his fantasy. Roarke tells Tattoo that he’ll receive no help and no money from him. Tattoo is shocked and I’m wondering if this means that Fred will get a refund. I mean, Fantasy Island is not cheap. Actually, if Fred already had enough money to come to Fantasy Island, that does make his fantasy seem a little bit weird. It seems like you have to be a millionaire to get your fantasy in the first place.
Roarke, I should add, is a hypocrite because he totally suspends the rules for this week’s other guest. Mandy Breem (Carol Lynley) has come to the Island with her fantasy being that she wants the Island to save her life. However, Mandy refused to explain all of the details of her fantasy until she came to the Island. Roarke allows her to come, despite not knowing what she wants. If Tattoo did something like that, Roarke would never let him hear the end of it.
So, what is Mandy’s fantasy? A year ago, Mandy’s husband (Adam West) underwent a surgery. Fearful of his life, Mandy made a deal with …. THE DEVIL! She agreed that, if he saved her husband’s life, she would give up her soul in a year’s time. Well, that year is coming to a close and Mandy has come to Fantasy Island, hoping that she can somehow get out of the deal. The Devil (played by a dapper Roddy McDowall) has followed her and soon, Roarke must confront the Lord of Darkness for the sake of Mandy’s soul.
This is a really fun story, largely because the performance of Roddy McDowall as the devil. Wearing a black suit and a white tie and delivering all of his lines with just the right mix of menace, sarcasm, and camp McDowall is the ideal trickster. The smoky confrontation between Roarke and the Devil is the highlight of the episode, with both Montalban and McDowall both seeming to relish they drama of the moment. Ricardo Montalban once said that, while the show’s producers wanted to keep Roarke as enigmatic as possible, he always envisioned Roarke as being a fallen angel who was doing his penance on Fantasy Island. And, indeed, there is a hint of that in his confrontation with the Devil, with the show suggesting that this is neither the first nor the final time that the two shall meet.
As for the other fantasy, Tattoo’s solution is to steal a magic lamp and give it to Mike. Mike rubs the lamp and wishes for a million dollars. A briefcase full of money flies through the sky and lands in front of him. Mike is convinced the magic worked but actually the briefcase was tossed out of a moving car and now, three thieves (Arlene Golonka, Ross Martin, and Joe Turkel) want their money back! It all works out in the end. Despite Roarke’s earlier refusal to grant Fred his wish, this was ultimately a typical Fantasy Island fantasy. While it really couldn’t compete with Mr. Roarke facing off against the Devil, it did, at least, give Tattoo something to do. One gets the feeling that this episode was specifically conceived so that both Ricardo Montalban and Herve Villechaize could get their chance in the spotlight without having to actually interact with each other. And it works out wonderfully, with Tattoo’s silly antics providing a nice balance to the more dramatic stuff involving Mr. Roarke.
All in all, even if it’s obvious that Ricardo Montalban and Herve Villechaize were still not getting along behind the scene, this was a fantastic start for season 4!
The following was posted on 4/6/2007 from my LiveJournal on Grindhouse (which is celebrating it’s 15th Anniversary). I’ll admit I respect Death Proof a bit more now than I did back then:
Gotta write fast. Have to jump into shower and head for work.
I got into the movie theatre at about 8pm, and spent the hour talking with a pair of film students from the School of Visual Arts. At 9 (an hour before the movie), the rest of the sold out crowd appeared. I was officially 3rd in line. Sweet. 🙂 I didn’t my preferred seat (the single one on the right reserved for patrons coming in with someone in a wheelchair), but did get a seat in the empty row (meaning I could stretch my legs, even better).
The short of it: Grindhouse is paying one low price for 2 bad movies, on purpose. You get 3 great built in trailers, and two mini movies. Between the two mini movies, I loved “Planet Terror” (the Rodriguez one) more than “Death Proof” (The Tarantino film), simply because Death Proof had too much of Tarantino’s conversational style that all of his films have. It’s like you’re listening to a conversation that absolutely doesn’t tie itself to any of the storyline’s major points. It’s just “cool” stuff, but I literally almost fell asleep until Kurt Russell showed up on screen. I think that if one knows to expect this from Tarantino, it comes across better. It’s like watching both Kill Bill volumes back to back. The first one’s cool and action packed, and the second one has some action (the chase scene alone in Death Proof had me wondering how they did that), but is so slow before getting there, you want to sigh.
Being a Charmed Fan, it was great to see Rose McGowan again, and there were so many cameos to laugh at. Fergie has a cameo, and Michael Biehn’s (“Hicks” from Aliens, Navy Seals) even in this. Where did they dig up these guys?
Grindhouse is easily a party film. I’d go see it again in the theatre, but I don’t see myself getting the DVD. It takes you back about a good 30 years, and does that really well. There are missing reels, serious jump cuts in the film and the sound sometimes cuts out. 🙂 In that sense, it’s really beautiful. The audience laughed and applauded, though there were some that at the end were like “Man, that sucked.” In the 60’s and 70’s, Grindhouse movies were pretty bad. I guess it’s like watching one of those old Hammer films, mixed in with a cheap horror flick. You have to walk into this movie not expecting “The Departed” for it to work. Just have fun with what you’re seeing and remember, this is what your parents sometimes saw in the movies (it should be noted that my parents went to something of a Grindhouse once – the movie they went to see was Night of the Living Dead. The other movie that was in the show was John Carpenter’s “Halloween”, which freaked my Dad out).
The music in particular is really great. Robert Rodriguez, Chingon, and a few friends come up with a sound for Planet Terror that’s in essence a John Carpenter like sound. If you have access to the Itunes Music Store, give it a listen (I bought it). Plus, if you’re a fan of some of the older movies out there, you’ll find references to some of Carpenter’s films in there (for example, one of the songs from “Escape from New York” is actually used in the film). The same occurs with the soundtrack from “Creepshow” – The story with the drowned couple. There are also tons of older Tarantino/Rodriguez references in there. One fellow actually yelled out a line, word for word, from what was on screen. It took me a second to realize the line came from “From Dusk Till Dawn”. Sweet.
The in betwen trailers are absolutely fantastic. If I were to get the DVD, it would probably be for this reason alone. You can tell that Rob Zombie, Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead) and Eli Roth (Hostel) really had fun with their pieces.
So, Grindhouse is worth seeing in theatre at least once with a bunch of friends, but know what you’re walking into. The movie can get gross at times and no young kid should even be brought near to this (we got carded to actually get into the theatre, and a Weinstein Rep. was on hand after the film to let us take surveys). Also before the movies, one of the teaser trailers is for Rob Zombie’s “Halloween”. I haven’t been so excited for a horror film like this since Zack Snyder’s version of “Dawn of the Dead”. This looks really good, and I’m wondering what Michael Myers is going to look like when someone like Tyler Mane (Sabretooth from the first X-Men movie) is playing him. That’s going to be creepy.
Teenager Jennifer (Alicia Silverstone, shortly before she starred in Clueless) is hired to babysit Jimmy (Ryan Slater), the son of Denise (Lee Garlington) and Harry Tucker (J.T. Walsh) while the Tuckers attend a party over at the the home of Bill and Bernice Holstein (played by George Segal and Lois Chiles). Harry spends the night drinking and fantasizing about Jennifer while Denise spends the night fantasizing about Bill. Who does Bernice fantasize about? The movie doesn’t say.
The adults aren’t the only ones fantasizing. Bill’s son, Mark (Nicky Katt), is also obsessed with Jennifer and, while his parents are holding their party, he hangs out with his friend Jack (Jeremy London), who also happens to be Jennifer’s bitter ex-boyfriend. Jack and Mark both start to discuss their own fantasies about Jennifer and they make plans to head over to the Tucker House and surprise Jennifer. (Mark has even more in mind.) Meanwhile, even little Jimmy is having fantasies of his own.
Today, it can be easy to forget just what a big deal Alicia Silverstone was in the early to mid-90s. Even before she landed her star-making turn in Clueless, Silverstone achieved fame as the star of three videos from Aerosmith, all of which featured her playing roles that personified male fantasies. Her role in The Babysitter fits right in with those Aerosmith videos as the entire film is devoted to men fantasizing about her. Not much is revealed about who The Babysitter is and her name isn’t even revealed until the end of the movie. Instead, the movie is about how every male in town, except for George Segal, is obsessed with her. (What makes George Segal so special?) Fortunately, Silverstone had the right mix of innocence and sultry beauty to be believable as everyone’s object of lust. She does a good job playing both the normal teenage girl who just wants to make some extra money babysitting and also the exaggerated caricature who appears in everyone’s fantasies. (Some of the fantasy scenes are ridiculous but most fantasies are.)
Especially after the release of Clueless, The Babysitter was advertised as being a softcore thriller and it used to show up frequently on late night Cinemax, playing alongside films like Body Chemistry. Actually, it’s a satire of the suburbs that follows all of the men as they have too much to drink and make fools of themselves. Thematically, it has more in common with movies like American Beauty, The Ice Storm, and The Virgin Suicides than it does to anything that’s ever been made by Shannon Tweed. While many viewers were undoubtedly disappointed that Silverstone remained clothed for the majority of the film (and that even the scene where she took a bath was carefully shot to suggest more than it showed), The Babysitter was not a bad movie and it provided the great J.T. Walsh with a rare leading role. The Babysitter is a better-than-expected mix of Nabokov and Cheever.
What’s an Insomnia File? You know how some times you just can’t get any sleep and, at about three in the morning, you’ll find yourself watching whatever you can find on cable? This feature is all about those insomnia-inspired discoveries!
Last night, if you were up at 2 in the morning, you could have turned over to Starz and watched the atmospheric 2002 mystery, Insomnia.
I have to admit that I’m cheating a little bit by including Insomnia in a series about obscure films that you might find on cable late at night. While Insomnia does seem to often turn up during the early morning hours, it’s hardly an obscure film. A remake of an acclaimed Norwegian film, it not only stars three Oscar winners (Al Pacino, Robin Williams, and Hilary Swank) but it was directed by Christopher Nolan. Insomnia got a lot of attention when it was first released in 2002. But, doing an insomnia file about a movie that’s actually about insomnia was just too good of an opportunity to pass up.
I should also mention that I didn’t have insomnia last night. I was up because I currently have a cold and I watched Insomnia in a feverish and congested haze. And yet I couldn’t help but feel that, somehow, that was actually the ideal way to watch Insomnia. With its ominous atmosphere and Nolan’s eye for the surreal, Insomnia plays out like a semi-lucid fever dream.
A teenage girl has been murdered in a small Alaskan fishing village. The chief of police (played by the great character actor Paul Dooley) asks his former LAPD partner, Will Dormer (Al Pacino), to come to Alaska and help with the investigation. Accompanying Dormer is his partner and friend, Hap Eckhart (Martin Donovan).
Dormer has issues that go far beyond anything happening in Alaska. He’s burned out and he’s plagued by rumors that, in the past, he was a crooked cop. He’s being investigated by Internal Affairs and, shortly after they arrive in Alaska, Eckhart admits that he’s been given immunity as part of a deal to testify against Dormer. While pursuing the suspected murderer through the Alaskan fog, Dormer fires his gun. When the fog clear, Dormer discovers that he’s killed Eckhart. Was it an accident or did Dormer intentionally shoot his partner? Not even Dormer seems to know for sure. He lies and says that the murderer shot Eckhart.
Working with a local detective (Hilary Swank), Dormer tries to solve the Alaska murder, with the knowledge that, once he does, he’ll have to return to Los Angeles and he’ll probably be indicted. Because of the midnight sun, night never falls in Alaska and, tortured by guilt, Dormer cannot sleep. Add to that, the murderer knows that Dormer shot Eckhart. And now, he’s calling Dormer and cruelly taunting him.
Who is the murderer? His name is Walter Finch. He’s a writer and, in a stroke of brilliance, he’s played by none other than Robin Williams. To me, Robin Williams’s screen presence always carried hints of narcissism and self-destruction. Even in comedic roles, there was a transparent but very solid wall between Williams the audience. When he was shouting out a thousand words a minute and rapidly switching from one character to the next, it always seemed as if it was all a technique to keep anyone from figuring out who he really was. In Insomnia (and, that same year, in One Hour Photo), Robin Williams reveals an inner darkness that he rarely showed before or after. Finch may possess Williams’s trademark eccentric smile and nervous voice but, underneath the surface, he’s an empty shell who views human beings as being as disposable as the characters in his paperback novels.
Christopher Nolan takes us directly into the heads of these two enemies, with shots of the desolate Alaskan landscape seeming to perfectly capture the inner desolation of two minds destroyed by guilt and paranoia. (Neither Finch nor Dormer is capable of connecting with the world outside of his damaged psyche.) As seen through Nolan’s lens, Alaska becomes as surreal and haunting as one of the dream landscapes from Inception.For those of us who found both The Dark Knight Rises and Interstellar to be so bombastic that they verged on self-parody, Insomnia is a nice reminder that Nolan doesn’t need a pounding Han Zimmer score to make a great movie. With Insomnia, Nolan gives us not bombast but a deceptively low-key and atmospheric journey into the heart of darkness.
Ironically, for a film about two men who cannot sleep, Insomnia will haunt your dreams.
For our next entry in Embracing the Melodrama Part II, we take a look at Jodie Foster in the 2007 film The Brave One. And…
Well, how to put this delicately?
I hate hate hate hate HATE this movie, with every last fiber of my being. I hated it the first time that I saw it and I hated it when I recently rewatched it and right now, I’m hating the fact that I even decided to review this damn film because it means that I’m going to have to think about it. I’m going to try to get this review over with quickly because, with each minute that I think about this film, I doubt my commitment to cinema. That’s how much I hate this movie. If I’m not careful, I’m going to end up joining a nunnery before I finish this review…
So, in The Brave One, Jodie Foster plays Erica Bain. Erica lives in New York and hosts one of those pretentious late night radio shows that are always popular in movies like this but which, in real life, nobody in their right mind would waste a second listening to. Erica spends her time musing about life in the big city and hoping that we can all just love one another and expressing a lot of other thoughts that sound like they’ve been stolen from an automated twitter account.
Erica also has a boyfriend. His name is David and he’s played by Naveen Andrews. That means that he looks good and he has a sexy accent and when he first shows up, you hope that he’ll stick around for a while because otherwise, you’re going to have to listen to move of Erica’s radio monologues. But nope — one night, while walking through Central Park, David and Erica are attacked. David is killed. Erica is raped. And their dog is taken by the gang!
(And the film doesn’t seem to know which it thinks is worse…)
When Erica gets out of the hospital, she is, at first, terrified to leave her apartment. Or, at least, she’s terrified to leave her apartment for about five minutes. But then she does find the courage to go outside and, of course, the first thing she does is buy a gun. At first, she’s buying the gun for her own state of mind but, almost immediately after purchasing her firearms, she happens to stumble across a convenience store robbery.
Bang! Bang! Erica’s a vigilante now!
But, of course, she’s not really sure if that’s what she wants to be. Even though she eventually ends up sitting on a subway and waiting for a guy to approach her so she can shoot him, Erica is still never really that comfortable with the idea of seeking vengeance. And this is why I hated The Brave One. The film is so damned wishy washy about Erica’s motivations. Instead of allowing Erica to get any sort of satisfaction or emotional fulfillment out of her actions, The Brave One has her constantly doubting whether or not violence is the answer. And don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that violence is the answer. But if you’re going to make a film about a female vigilante who is out looking for vengeance, why don’t you at least allow her to get some sort of empowerment out of her actions? That doesn’t mean that the film itself can’t be ambiguous about what she’s doing. But by having Erica constantly questioning her actions, it makes her into a weak character and it lets the men who raped her and the ones who subsequently threaten to do the same off the hook. It allows them to be seen as victims, as opposed to products of a society where men are raised to believe that women will never fight back.
There’s a far superior New York-set film that has almost the same plot as The Brave One. The title of that film was Ms. 45. It was made for a hundred times less money than The Brave One and, at the same time, it was and remains a hundred times better. (I previously wrote about Ms. 45 and The Brave One in my essay, Too Sordid To Ever Be Corrupted.)
The difference between the two films can be summed up by the film’s tag lines. The Brave One was advertised with, “How many wrongs to make it right?” Ms. 45 was advertised with: “She was abused and violated … IT WILL NEVER HAPPEN AGAIN!” Ms. 45 features a vigilante who never doubts her actions and, as a result, she becomes a symbol not of violence but of empowerment. Meanwhile, Jodie Foster is so constantly wracked with guilt and doubt that the film almost seems to be criticizing her for not staying in her apartment and trusting the police (represented by Terrence Howard and Nicky Katt) to do their job.
Oh! And, of course, at the end of the film, Erica gets her dog back. Because nobody ever permanently loses their dog in a big budget studio film…
And really, that’s why The Brave One is such a failure. It takes a subject that was tailor-made for the grindhouse and attempts to give it the slick and self-important studio approach. And part of that approach is that no one can be offended. This is a film that both wants to celebrate and condemn at the same time.
First released in 1993, Dazed and Confused is a classic Texas film. Taking place in 1976 and following a large and varied group of characters over the course of the last day of school, Dazed and Confused is like American Graffiti with a lot more weed. In many ways, it’s a plotless film, though things do happen. The students of Lee High School survive one final day of school before the start of summer. (Interestingly enough, most of the characters here are incoming seniors and freshman, as opposed to the confused graduates who usually show up in films like this. This may lower the stakes — none of the students are worrying about whether or not to go to college or anything like that — but it also gives the film a fun and laid back vibe.) The incoming freshman are all hazed by the incoming seniors. For the girls, this means being covered in ketchup and mustard and being forced to ask the seniors to marry them. For the boys, the hazing is a lot more violent and disturbing as they are chased through the streets by paddle-wielding jocks. A party is planned and then abruptly canceled when the kegs of beer are delivered before the parents leave town. Another party is held out in the woods. A high school quarterback tries to decide whether or not to sign an anti-drug pledge.
No, not much happens but then again, plot is overrated. Dazed and Confused is not about plot. It’s about capturing a specific time and place and showing how different individuals define themselves within their environment. It’s one of the best high school films ever made, perhaps the best.
Why do I so love Dazed and Confused? Let me count the ways.
First off, it’s a true Texas film. This isn’t just because it was directed by Texas’s greatest filmmaker, Richard Linklater. It was also filmed in Texas, it’s full of Texas actors, and, as a native Texan, I can tell you that it’s one of the few films that gets my homestate right. Even though the film takes place long before I was even born, there were still so many details that I recognized as being unique to Texas today. I guess the more things change, the more they remain the same.
Perhaps the most Texas scene in the entire film was when quarterback Randy Floyd (Jason London) was talking to the old couple at the minor league baseball game. Both the old man’s obsessive interest in the high school football team (“We’re countin’ on you boys next year…”) and Randy’s patiently polite answers, were, to me, the epitome of Texas. And, of course, we can’t forget the store clerk advising the pregnant woman to eat a lot of “green things” while selling her a pack of cigarettes and the guy who reacts to the destruction of his mailbox by running around with a gun. I suspect I might live a few blocks away from both of those guys.
But, beyond that, just the entire film’s laid back atmosphere epitomized everything that I love about my state.
Secondly, Dazed and Confused is an amateur historian’s dream! Richard Linklater went to high school in the 70s and he recreates the decade with a lot of obvious care and love. (It’s also somewhat obvious that both the characters of Randy and incoming freshman Mitch (Wiley Wiggins) are meant to be autobiographical.) Now, me, I’ve always been obsessive about history and I’ve always somewhat regretted that I was born long after the 70s ended. Dazed and Confused is probably about as close as someone like me will ever get to having a time machine.
I’m also something a political history junkie so how excited was I to see that, during one scene, all of the candidates for the 1976 Democratic presidential nomination were listed on a bulletin board. How many other movies have featured a reference to the Fred Harris presidential campaign? Admittedly, I know nothing about that campaign. I just think it’s neat that somebody with as common a name as Fred Harris once ran for President.
Finally, if you look really carefully, you’ll notice that Lee High School is located right next to a movie theater that, according to its marquee, is showing Family Plot, Alfred Hitchcock’s final film. Just imagine the fun that I could have had going to Lee High. I could have skipped school and gone to a movie!
Third, this film has a great soundtrack! The low rider gets a little higher … hey, I think there’s a double meaning there…
But, really, the main reason I love this film is because I love great ensemble work and Dazed and Confused has a wonderful cast. Some members of the cast went on to become famous and some did not, but all of them give great performances. In fact, the entire cast is so great that it’s difficult to know who to single out so I’m just going to name a few of my favorites.
First off, there’s the jocks. Some of them, like Jason London’s Randy “Pink” Floyd are surprisingly sensitive. Some of them, like Don Dawson (Sasha Jenson), remind me of the type of guys that I, despite my better judgment, would have totally been crushing on back in high school. And then the others are just scary, running around with their cars full of beer and obsessively paddling freshman. Benny (Cole Hauser), for instance, really does seem like he has some issues. (Perhaps it’s because he lives in Texas but still has such a strong Boston accent…)
However, the scariest of the jocks is, without a doubt, Fred O’Bannion (Ben Affleck). A complete and total moron who has actually managed to fail his senior year, (“He’s a joke,” says Randy, “but he’s not a bad guy to have blocking for you…”) O’Bannion is such a total idiot that, not only is it fun to see him eventually get humiliated, but it’s even more fun to watch him and think, “That’s Ben Affleck!” And, it must be said, Affleck is totally convincing playing a complete and total dumbass. That’s not meant to be an insult, by the way. Future multiple-Oscar winner Affleck does a really good job.
And then there’s the three self-styled intellectuals, Tony (Anthony Rapp), Mike (Adam Goldberg), and red-headed Cynthia (Marissa Ribisi), who spend the whole day driving around and discussing what it all means. These are actually three of my favorite characters in the entire film, just because I’ve known (and, I must admit, loved) the type. Plus, Cynthia has red hair and we redheads have to stay united!
There’s the two incoming freshman who get to spend a night hanging out with the older kids — Mitch (Wiley Wiggins) and Sabrina (Christin Hinojosa). Mitch is adorable while Sabrina gets to ask Tony to marry her. Of course, Sabrina is covered in ketchup, mustard, and flour at the time. (“She probably looks really good once you get all the shit off her,” Mike offers.)
And, of course, you can’t forget Wooderson (Matthew McConaughey). In many ways, Wooderson is a truly creepy character. He’s the older guy who still hangs out with the high school kids. When he asks Mitch what the incoming freshman girls look like, you get the disturbing feeling that he’s not joking. (“I get older but they stay the same age,” Wooderson says about his underage girlfriends, “yes, they do.”) And yet McConaughey gives such a charismatic performance that Wooderson becomes the heart and soul of the entire film. In the end, you’re happy that Randy has a friend like Wooderson.
And there’s so many other characters that I love. There’s the hilarious stoner Slater (Rory Cochrane). There’s Mitch’s older sister, Jodi (Michelle Burke), who is the type of cool older sister that I would have liked to have been if I actually had a brother and wasn’t the youngest of four. There’s Randy’s girlfriend, Simone (Joey Lauren Adams) and Don’s occasional girlfriend, Shavonne (Deena Martin) who, at one point, refers to Don as being “Mr. Premature Ejaculation.” Even the characters that you’re supposed to hate are so well-played and so well-written that it’s a pleasure to see them. Parker Posey is hilarious as head mean girl Darla. In the role of car-obsessed Clint, Nicky Katt is dangerously hot — even if he does eventually end up kicking Mike’s ass. (“You wouldn’t say I got my ass kicked, would you?” Mike says. Sorry, sweetie, you did. But everyone watching the movie totally loved you!)
(And let’s not forget that future Oscar winner Renee Zellweger shows up for a split-second, walking past Wooderson during his “that’s why I love high school girls” monologue.)
Dazed and Confused is a great film. If you haven’t seen it, see it. And if you have seen it, see it again.
Through the Shattered Lens 