Really sorry I can't credit the photos.
I nicked them some time ago.
A huge '70s revival went on back in the 1990's. Bell bottoms and platforms made a comeback, disco music was covered by showbands at clubs and That '70s Show was a top-rating sitcom. Here and there were movies set in the 1970s.
Dazed and Confused was set in 1976. It shows a day in the lives of some high-schoolers - the last day of school to be exact. It doesn't really follow the story of any one of them, but shows bits and pieces about the incoming seniors and incoming freshmen.
It's supposedly rife with '70s cliches - as in, actual people from back then are supposed to be reminded of actual people who were like the characters. I heard that to fully appreciate this flick, you had to be a teenager in 1976. I wasn't even born then yet.
Cliches in a teen movie definitely mean stereotypes, so here we go ...
There were the football-playing, pot-smoking jocks:
At left is the cute one (Jason London), at right is the brawny one.
At left is the cute one (Jason London), at right is the brawny one.
The nervous incoming freshmen, straight from their last day of middle school:
The queen bee:
A cute Parker Posey in shoulder pads and super-short, ratty denim cutoffs.A couple of years ago she played Lex Luther's girlfriend Kitty in Superman Returns.
I think it was the fashion for girls in the late '70s to cut their old jeans so short that the pockets stuck out. I once heard a story of how girls used to sew their clothes themselves, and some daring ones made skirts the length of their hand-span.
The nice bitch / popular jock's steady girl:
Joey Lauren Adams. She was in a few other '90s teen movies after this.Her most recent notable role was as Jennifer Aniston's character's friend in The Break-Up.
A silent, pot-smoking, hippie-chick girlfriend:
She's so gorgeous, you noticed her presence even if she hardly said a thing.This is model/actress Milla Jovovich, before she was famous. We know her today as Resident Evil action hero Alice.
A soup-brained pothead:
If you're a fan of CSI: Miami, you may recognize Rory Cochrane as Speedle (the agent who died). He was also in 24.
A dumb bully who will be repeating his senior year with the incoming batch:
Recognize this actor?This is Ben Affleck, in his pre-Good Will Hunting, pre-stardom days.
One of the other dudes intent on paddling the freshmen:
After graduating from teen roles, Cole Hauser was later in 2 Fast 2 Furious, Tears of the Sun, and The Break-Up.
A sleazy older guy who won't relinquish his high school glory days:
Matthew McConaughey, with the pedophile mustache.
Apparently male fashion included ultratight pants and ultratight shirts with folded sleeves. Men sometimes stuffed a packet of cigarettes into one of the folded sleeves - see McConaughey above. I remember my uncle used to do that up until the early '80s.
The not-so-popular kids:
Adam Goldberg at left. You may have noticed him from Friends or Saving Private Ryan.
At right is Anthony Rapp. He's Mark in both the theater and film versions of Rent.
The not-so-popular readhead was played by Marisa Ribisi.Today she's mostly known as Giovanni Ribisi's twin sister, or Beck's significant other.
And the various background people:
You probably didn't spot her, but that's a chubby Renee Zellweger in an obscure role.This flick was cool stuff when I was a teenager - I don't remember exactly why though. I recently watched it as an adult and went, What the heck was that all about again? There were funny and/or interesting scenes in there, but as the credits rolled I realized that the whole movie was just a series of funny and/or interesting scenes that don't make up much of a story - which isn't really a bad thing, especially since the movie title includes the words dazed and confused.
