George Lucas's "American Graffiti" is an explosion of good-natured nostalgia with a killer soundtrack of rock and roll songs that have, since 1973, been utilized in films so often that they have become cliches. So have coming-of-age films being swathed in nostalgia, whether it is a film set in 1962 or the 1950's - for the baby boomers, they were the last truly innocent decades (though history shows they were anything but). The movie is a rollicking good time, a reflection of an era when no high school graduate had any idea what the future held. They knew their present and that is all they had to go on. Watching the film you get the impression that these Modesto, California teens wouldn't mind staying in town forever listening to Wolfman Jack, cruising in their cars, and making out.
In a sense, that is the film's charm because would anyone really want to become an adult? No, no teenager wants to grow up yet they know they eventually have to. Richard Dreyfuss's Curt is the one who is ambivalent - can he go to college out-of-state and become a great writer or is he premature in assuming a future that might lead to something else? No one else really struggles with that notion, outside of his best friend Steve (Ron Howard). Curt also has a night where he sees a mysterious blonde woman (Suzanne Somers) driving by in a white Thunderbird, cruising as everyone else does, who says something to him but Curt can't make out what she says. He spends the rest of the film looking for this blonde and feels, for the first time, that his life has purpose. It is a singular mission to find this elusive beauty, but who is she and what did she say to him?
"American Graffiti" takes place during one long night where cruising teenagers drink and make out and it is largely episodic as we float in from one group to another. Charles Martin Smith is the nerdy Terry who gets mixed up with another blonde girl (Candy Clark) and pretends the car he is borrowing is his, yet he has trouble getting liquor with no ID (how he finally gets some Old Harper's produces one of the biggest belly laughs in the entire film). Meanwhile, there's the aforementioned Steve and his long-term girlfriend, Laurie (Cindy Williams), and Steve has no ambivalence about going to college and suggests that he and Laurie see other people. Naturally this causes some tension despite them dancing and pretending to have a good time while The Platters' "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes" is played by a cover band at one of those sock hops. Then there's the cool John Milner (Paul Le Mat), a drag-racer who is challenged by fearless Bob Falfa (Harrison Ford) to a drag race. While John tries to avoid Bob, he reluctantly gives a ride to a precocious 12-year-old girl (Mackenzie Phillips) and their brief moments together suggests a softer side to John who acts like her big brother, a protector of sorts.
"American Graffiti" ends with title cards indicating certain characters' fates but it is not needed. The film exists as a moment in time before the Cuban Missile Crisis and JFK's assassination - a vastly entertaining mood piece of nostalgic reminders of great cars, great music and a white 56' T-Bird with an enigmatic blonde. Curt sees her car as he's flying to college and smiles - a momentary pause where such a great night ends and evaporates though it is retained as a memory. One of the saddest and yet most exhilarating endings of all time. I only wish Lucas made more films like this.
