Dazed and Confused (1993)

Dazed and Confused (R) - Review

"Lots of people talkin', few of them know"

School is out in Texas and as the teens and young adults begin their revelry on the darkening streets a group of friends and acquaintances begin to coalesce and intermingle and inebriate a story emerges of coming of age and friendship in one night in 1976 Austin.

Richard Linklater (Slacker, Bernie) brings his directorial microscope to bear on his young adulthood in Weirdtown, TX USA.  Drugs, sex, Aerosmith concerts and partying all night all summer are the norms for these children of the post-love generation.  It is a fascinating for an outsider to watch, a social study on an almost unrecognizable American society where grads have sacred rituals and kids don't text their mothers when they are out past 10.  An amazingly large and talented cast of then up an comers light up the camera including Milla Jovovich, Jason London, Joey Lauren Adams, Parker Posey, Ben Affleck as a overly aggressive spankhappy zealot and Matthew Mcconaughey as the grown up slacker sex fiend everyone wishes (at the time) they could grow up to be.  A night in the life of these teens rings true to an America that once was, whether you are too old or too young to have remembered it takes away nothing from it's charm.  The lenses on these rose tinted glasses are thick as coke bottles, but they make you sound like John Lennon and look just like a young Steven Tyler.

9 Pop Tops out of 10 (GREAT)