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MOVIES / ON DVD / AMERICAN GRAFFITI
American Graffiti

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American Graffiti (1973)

97%
100%
92%
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97 %
Reviews Counted: 33 Fresh: 32  Rotten:1 Average Rating: 8.3/10
 
Consensus: Funny, nostalgic, and bittersweet. One of the most influential of all teen films, American Graffiti is a funny, nostalgic, and bittersweet look at a group of recent high school grads' last days of innocence. more
 
Runtime: 1 hr 52 mins
Synopsis:
Set in 1962; Produced and released in 1973. AMERICAN GRAFFITI presents a powerful collage of youth on the brink of maturity just before the assassination of J.F.K.. Based on George Lucas's own teenage hot-rodding days in Modesto, California, this brilliant, bittersweet comedy... [More]
Set in 1962; Produced and released in 1973. AMERICAN GRAFFITI presents a powerful collage of youth on the brink of maturity just before the assassination of J.F.K.. Based on George Lucas's own teenage hot-rodding days in Modesto, California, this brilliant, bittersweet comedy inspired numerous other productions, including the long-running TV series HAPPY DAYS. Lucas's second feature film (following THX 1138), AMERICAN GRAFFITI contains an early screen appearance by Harrison Ford, who would figure heavily in the director's next movie, the sci-fi epic STAR WARS. The film follows one night in the lives of several recently graduated high school students. The genial Steve (Ron Howard) prepares to leave for college the next day, and Laurie (Cindy Williams), his girlfriend, is upset by his impending departure. Laurie's brother, Curt (Richard Dreyfuss), the class intellectual, is also slated for college, but he has serious doubts about his future. Also included here are the hopeless nerd (Charles Martin Smith) and the eternally cool drag racer, John (Paul LeMat), who feels pressure to live up to his reputation. A nostalgic feeling is evoked in seeing the teenagers cruising in their hot rods, eating at Mel's Diner, and listening to Wolfman Jack spin the latest hits, with the camera jumping from character to character as they each enjoy--or fret over--their last moments of summer freedom. [Less]

Genre: Comedies

Starring: Richard Dreyfuss, Ron Howard, Cindy Williams, MacKenzie Phillips, Candy Clark

Director: George Lucas
Screenwriter: George Lucas, Gloria Katz, Willard Huyck
Producer: Gary Kurtz, Francis Ford Coppola

DVD Info

Release:

Apr 5, 2001

[DVD Details]

Reviews

 
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1 - 20 (sorted by date; UK critics are listed first)
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Ratings Image

A funny-serious movie with gorgeous cars and colours and an amazing feel for the artefacts of an instantly vanished era.

Full Review | Comment
05/06/08 05:31 PM
Empire Magazine
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Lucas' direction is skilful and assured -- he follows several stories with wit and sensitivity -- and he's matched by his cast, the whole film perfectly evoking the end of an era.

Full Review | Comment
05/06/08 05:30 PM
Channel 4 Film
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The film that launched a thousand careers.

Full Review | Comment
06/24/06 03:59 AM
Geoff Andrew
Time Out
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No review available.

| Comment
10/21/07 05:39 PM
Cole Smithey
ColeSmithey.com
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There is brilliant interplaying and underplaying, of script, performers and direction which will raise howls of laughter from audiences, yet never descends on the screen to overdone mugging, pratfall and other heavy-handed devices normally employed.

Full Review | Comment
06/27/07 06:11 PM
A.D. Murphy
Variety
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A brilliant work of popular art, it redefined nostalgia as a marketable commodity and established a new narrative style, with locale replacing plot, that has since been imitated to the point of ineffectiveness.

Full Review | Comment
06/27/07 06:09 PM
Dave Kehr
Chicago Reader
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No review available.

| Comment
02/15/07 03:44 PM
Susan Granger
www.susangranger.com
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No review available.

| Comment
01/15/07 05:05 PM
Michael Dequina
Mr. Brown's Movies
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No review available.

| Comment
03/09/06 08:41 PM
Jake Euker
F5 (Wichita, KS)
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If Last picture Show presents gloomy portrait of small-town life prior to the advent of TV, Lucas moves the setting forward by a decade, in 1962, when TV had already become the mainstay of pop culture, though for his youths, radio is the relevant medium.

Full Review | Comment
02/13/06 02:48 PM
Emanuel Levy
EmanuelLevy.Com
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...the ultimate nostalgia movie of all time ...

Full Review | Comment
12/06/05 07:57 PM
Brad Laidman
Film Threat
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No review available.

| Comment
07/26/05 01:03 PM
Emanuel Levy
EmanuelLevy.Com
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Lucas' sleeper hit...casts a rose-colored eye back to a placid pre-Vietnam America, a time when rock 'n' roll was young and hot rods were cool.

Full Review | Comment
06/03/05 02:38 PM
Thomas Delapa
Boulder Weekly
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No review available.

| Comment
06/01/05 09:17 AM
Jules Brenner
Cinema Signals
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A successful tribute to an era of optimism and competitiveness which was bitchin’ -- and now seems very far in the past.

Full Review | Comment
05/04/05 11:37 AM
David Bezanson
Filmcritic.com
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American Graffiti acts almost as a milestone to show us how far (and in many cases how tragically) we have come.

Full Review | Comment
10/23/04 10:40 PM
Roger Ebert
Chicago Sun-Times
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Trend setter, nostalgic, feel good hit

| Comment
10/23/04 06:18 PM
Steve Crum
Kansas City Kansan
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No review available.

| Comment
03/06/04 12:08 AM
Ryan Cracknell
Movie Views
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A hallmark film of the 1970s.

Full Review | Comment
07/30/03 05:17 PM
TV Guide's Movie Guide
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No review available.

| Comment
07/09/03 01:56 PM
Rebecca Murray
About.com
1 - 20 (sorted by date; UK critics are listed first)
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