American Graffiti opened in the United States on August 11, 1973. The movie, directed and co-written by George Lucas, captured a nostalgia for a summer in 1962. I can hardly believe that now we are more than four times as much removed in time from the movie as the movie was removed from its characters.
American Graffiti follows two recent high school grads played by Ron Howard and Richard Dreyfus. The two are spending their last night in town before they are scheduled to leave for college the next day. During the evening and night, their stories intertwine with a number of other young men and women cruising in cars around town. The movie not only captures a time and a place (and hot rods!), but it also reveals some of what it is like to be in high school.
The coming-of-age movie featured a number of stars and future stars, including Paul Le Mat, Harrison Ford, Charles Martin Smith, Cindy Williams, Mackenzie Phillips, Candy Clark, and Suzanne Somers. Also, radio DJ Wolfman Jack makes a special appearance. The film also contained a lot of great music from the period and a wonderful soundtrack
Reception
Critics and viewers generally loved American Graffiti. The movie was nominated for five Academy Awards, including Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Picture. The movie failed to win any Oscars and lost the Best Picture award to The Sting. But the film set in Modesto, California became a beloved classic. It also aided the careers of many involved in the movie. And it helped spawn a nostalgia for the 1950s and early 1960s.
American Graffiti ends with title cards reporting what happened to all of the characters, even though Lucas’s co-writers did not like such an ending, which was largely depressing. That, however, did not prevent an interesting but mediocre sequel in 1979, More American Graffiti
When I was in high school, a few years after the movie was released, one of my teachers showed us the movie on a TV in class. We were studying the period around the 1950s. Our class was in the days before DVDs and VHS, so it was a big deal to see a commercial movie in class back then. So, I will always have a special fondness for the movie.
In the clip below, Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel discuss American Graffiti for the film’s debut on television (starting at the 16:30 mark). Check it out.
What do you think of “American Graffiti”? Leave your two cents in the comments.
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