Richard Linklater – ‘Dazed and Confused’
Richard Linklater’s 1993 film Dazed and Confused is heralded as one of the greatest coming-of-age comedies of all time. Starring an ensemble cast including Jason London, Ben Affleck, Milla Jovovich, Parker Posey and Matthew McConaughey, the film departs from the over-dramatic narratives of similar movies, focusing rather on the laissez-faire attitude of its characters.
The film centres on the last day of school at Lee High School in Austin, Texas, and follows the fate of several of its students as they prepare for the summer holidays. The freshmen are ardently trying to escape a good “paddling” by the seniors, a ritual that has run in the school for many years, while the seniors themselves are looking ahead to the summer escapades of getting stoned and hanging out before the pressures of their futures come into reality.
Amongst the young freshmen are Mitch Kramar, played by the fresh-faced Wiley Wiggins, who, though initially paddled by Ben Affleck’s Fred O’Bannion, is eventually assimilated into the seniors’ gang and is invited to visit the local pool hall even though he is underage. He later drinks alcohol, smokes weed, and kisses a girl for the first time, each moment made more memorable than the last in an ever-growing haze of nostalgia.
Perhaps the only other loose strand of narrative concerns senior Randall ‘Pink’ Floyd, star football player of the school, who is warned not to partake in drug consumption or get into any kind of trouble over the summer, the kind his “loser” friends spend most of their time doing. However, something in Pink resents the path laid out before him, and he wants to revel in the celebration of the summer with his friends and finally decides to join them, throwing caution to the wind concerning his future on the team.
The beauty of Dazed and Confused is that the stakes and the drama are always pretty low. The worst any of the characters might face is a scolding from their parents for smoking weed, a smack around the arse with a paddle from an angry senior, or a stern word from the school football coach. The result is that the film is a faithful recreation of what it is like to be a high school student, old or young. After all, what is the worst that could really happen? This is a lesson that Linklater is keen to remind us of.
There is, admittedly, a lack of narrative direction in the well-titled Dazed and Confused, but in its particular instance, it just isn’t wholly necessary. If anything, the lackadaisical approach reinforces the idea that youth is happily spent without direction and is all the better for it. We quickly ask ourselves the beautiful questions of ‘what should be done today and done now?’ as opposed to the stress of wondering how the rest of our lives will pan out.
Upon discussing his straying from the kind of coming-of-age films, we have seen from the likes of John Hughes, Linklater once stated: “It was really rare when the star-crossed lovers from the opposite side of the tracks and the girl gets pregnant, and there’s a car crash, and somebody dies. That didn’t really happen much. But riding around and trying to look for something to do with the music cranked up, now that happened a lot!”
In that light, Dazed and Confused is a simultaneous celebration of youth and a reminder to perhaps not take our lives so seriously. The film is shot with a gorgeously nostalgic outlook, and the soundtrack, featuring the likes of Alice Cooper, Deep Purple, Kiss and Black Sabbath, takes us right back to the mid-1970s when people were less utterly obsessed with the political and social perils that seem to ail us so in this age.
Linklater’s movie is simply a joy to behold; it lacks the serious pretence that often bogs down the coming-of-age film, swapping it instead for a loud stereo system, an empty field ripe for a party, and a few well-rolled joints. Watching Dazed and Confused might leave you happily dazed, but no confusion will linger. Rather, you’ll have gained clarity that things are going to be “alright, alright, alright”, so long as you maintain your youthful spirit.
