Dazed and Confused

Richard Linklater's gently ambling bong chronicle documents a scattered group of teenagers' day-long journey into partying in 1976. Sound like a recipe for wacky, bell-bottomed hijinks and libido-driven sexcapades? It's not. In fact, Dazed and Confused's most consistent charm is in its unassumingness—in almost anyone else's hands, this collection of characters would get caught up in all sorts of unbelievable clique rivalry hijinks at the Craziest. Party. Ever. But not tonight. Tonight, the party's OK until the keg is tapped, the football players turn out to be pretty alright dudes and no one learns any life lessons the screenwriters wish they could write to their teenage selves. Thank God. The way this film is typically misremembered (Cheech and Chong meets Can't Hardly Wait) probably says a lot about the way most people remember high school: they pluck out the few shining times, magnify them beyond their actual significance and try their best to forget the rest.
Fri., Aug. 15, 11:59 p.m.; Sat., Aug. 16, 11:59 p.m., 2008