Dazed and Confused

Released:  September 24^th, 1993

Rated:  R

Distributor:  Gramercy Pictures

Starring:  Jason London, Rory Cochrane, Wiley Wiggins, Adam Goldberg, Matthew McConaughey, Cole Hauser, Parker Posey, Milla Jovovich, Ben Affleck

Directed by:  Richard Linklater

Written by:  Richard Linklater

Personal Bias Alert:  Never was a partier, not a big Linklater fan

7.3 of 10

             At once specific and universal, Dazed and Confused will appeal to different people for different reasons.  Perhaps you grew up in Texas during the mid-70’s, perhaps you were (or are) a stoner, or perhaps you just grew up with a restless sense of misanthropy.  Chances are someone from the massive group of characters will line up with your own teenage self, and that’ll give you something to love during the lackadaisical meandering that Dazed and Confused will take you on.

            Following the high school students in a non-descript Texas town after school lets out for the summer, the various nerds, stoners, jocks, and freshman orbit around each other during a single night of debauchery.  Unlike most high school films, there aren’t rigid cliques, and the advent of summer doesn’t bring about a revelatory mood.  Most of the characters are simply aimless and bored.  The most riled up they get is when the seniors initiate the freshman through degrading events that eventually gives way to comradery, but even too much enthusiasm for that is frowned upon.  No, the film is essentially just high school kids wandering around.  They occasionally get into trouble, but nothing to serious, and to be honest not much really happens.  But isn’t that what so many of us look back fondly on?  The years of hanging out with your friends, back when you had enough time to wallow with each other for hours?

            This distinct lack of plot can be off-putting, particularly as the film wanders through some early clichés.  A party is busted before it can start, an angsty teen rebels against nothing, and the seniors torment the freshman with minimal interference from the town’s adults (this farce is even commented upon by the characters).  Writer/director Richard Linklater has made many of these shuffling movies, and its highly likely that you already know if this style will bother you or not.  This isn’t a particularly clean way to tell a story, and it almost leaves you wondering if there’s an actually story there at all.  Instead, Linklater seems to use these films to capture the particular moods one passes through at different stages in their life, something that takes time to unveil itself in a film, leaving you with long stretches at the beginning where you wonder why the hell you’re watching these characters at all.

            But in the end, it’s the characters you come to appreciate the most.  Recognition, either in a real person or in a fictional character, is a surefire way to establish a bond, and Linklater has proven time and again that he can hook people with his relatable characters.  Many formed a bittersweet bond with the child and mother from Boyhood, and the 18-year spanning Before trilogy has spawned a personal investment in Jesse and Celine’s relationship for many fans.  In Dazed and Confused, Linklater gives us such a broad look at the high school population that there’s certainly someone in there for everyone.  Were you an uncomfortable poser?  Try freshman Mitch (Wiley Wiggins).  How about a laid-back guy looking for a decent time like Slater (Rory Cochrane)?  Or maybe the neurotic ramblings of Mike (Adam Goldberg) were more your jam (they were certainly mine).  The breadth of characters on display, and the precisely perfect casting that brought them to life, is what will make you fall into the spell of this little film.  Although, by the end, the memories it will evoke will make it seem anything but small.

            If Linklater’s intent with Dazed and Confused was to represent high school as it really is, then it’s near impossible to argue that he failed.  The twisting drift of the good-but-not-too-good night he portrayed is something we’ve all experienced, but the decidedly undisciplined approach doesn’t translate to an even film.

Other Notes:

Ø  This film is more entrancing than entertaining.

Ø  “I’m just trying to be honest about being a misanthrope.”

Ø  I see famous people.

Interstellar

Released:  November 7^th, 2014

Rated:  PG-13

Studio:  Paramount Pictures

Starring:  Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, Michael Caine

Directed by:  Christopher Nolan         

Written by:  Jonathan Nolan, Christopher Nolan

Personal Bias Alert:  likes the Nolan brothers, not a big McConaughey fan

7 of 10

            I tried to avoid hearing about Interstellar, but with the amount of times I go to theaters, seeing the trailer was almost inevitable.  Watching it took me on a bad roller coaster ride, with the good (an intriguing Michael Caine voiceover, excellent visuals, and the ever-steady Jessica Chastain) alternating with the bad (an overwritten line and references to the vague but mighty power of love), causing emotional whiplash between excitement and apprehension.  Still, I showed up for the first possible screening, an IMAX 70mm showing at 8pm Tuesday.  This is Nolan, after all, a director with a proven track record of making intelligent entertainment pieces.

            It would be easy to go on and on about what Interstellar isn’t.  It isn’t a perfect blend of smarts and spectacle.  It isn’t Nolan’s masterpiece.  It isn’t enough to carry him to Oscar glory.  But framing a review like that misses everything that Interstellar is:  an ambitious, messy, and at times wonderful piece of work.

            Matthew McConaughey stars as a single father recruited by NASA to pilot a small expedition that must travel through a wormhole and skirt the edges of black holes to save humanity.  You see, Earth is no longer able to support human life, so a new, hospitable planet must be found in a hurry.  McConaughey’s Coop is reticent to leave his children, a plot point that feels natural thanks to the time the Nolan brothers take to establish the family’s relationships at the beginning of the film.  Too often this sort of plot point is taken for granted, and the audience is expected to accept the parent’s tormented when we’ve only seen the entire family together for one or two scenes.  It’s not that we’re monsters; we understand intellectually the bond between parents and children, but it’s much more resonant if we’re allowed to see that bond play out.

            This early portion of the film also allows us to see just how bad it’s gotten on Earth.  I’ve long considered the American dust bowl the most terrifying time I’ve ever heard of, and Interstellar is clearly lifting from this time period’s problems.  There’s crop failure, dust storms, and economic hardships.  It’s the dust storm that give us the film’s first grand visual, and it’s truly a wonder to behold.  This and later sequences of space and foreign planets are high points of the film, impeccable to look at and lingered on just long enough to instill a sense of wonder.  If the film could have maintained the early part’s balance between story, character, and spectacle, this could have gone down as Nolan’s masterpiece.

            But Coop and company must leave Earth, after which the nuts and bolts of complex space travel and Nolan’s insistence on big action sequences take over.  Not enough time is dedicated to characters or emotional arcs, and these aspects remain largely stagnant until the very end of the film.  It’s really a failure of setup.  Only four people go on the mission:  the fully realized Coop, the erratic and hyperbolic Brand (Anne Hathaway), and two other men who have no character traits I can remember.  Sticking your main character in a situation like that leaves little room for meaningful interactions and leads to the stagnation and eventual regression of character that Coop undergoes.

            Then you get the failure of the actual story.  I won’t get into spoilery details, so let’s just say that it doesn’t make sense.  There’s a troublesome ontological paradox (look it up) and an ending that unsuccessfully tries to land the emotional arcs that the film had dropped during its long middle section.  There’s few ways to leave the audience less satisfied than to muck up the ending both intellectually and emotionally.

            Even with a bad ending and a lackluster middle section, there’s more than enough here to make this a good movie.   That early portion is almost flawless, and the spectacle of experiencing the film in theaters shouldn’t be missed.  The bar for this film was simply set too high by audiences and the Nolan brothers alike.  They bit off more than they could chew, and we saw the potential for what this could be and expected them to pull it off.  Interstellar is a lesser film than we all wanted it to be, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s bad.

            Other Notes:

Ø  This is paced very much like other Nolan films.  There’s the steadily building tension interspersed with big action sequences, but it lacks a true climax.

Ø  Once characters start talking about love transcending time and space, I check out.

Ø  McConaughey feels like a Coop.