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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Mel O&#039;Drama" data-source="post: 433337" data-attributes="member: 23">American Graffiti (1973) <img src="https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.filmpostergallery.co.nz%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2022%2F12%2FAmerican-Graffiti-Australian-One-Sheet-Movie-Poster-2_edited.jpg&f=1&nofb=1&ipt=80d6f8c42d78098673f8a617c3b5972b7282a1fe61a85452daa3de2370ab0e49" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " style="" />For my entire life this film has eluded me. I don't think it appealed that much when I was younger, then I'd missed my window. It's been in my Prime watchlist for a long time, and I noticed last night it had become free to view so I dived straight in.While I don't  believe I've watched a single frame of this film, there are snippets I've picked up about it here and there. I knew it had an impressive cast, most of whom were in their early days but went on to much bigger things: Richard Dreyfuss; Harrison Ford;  Ron Howard and Cindy Williams to name a few. I knew it was a coming-of-age film that looked back at a slightly earlier decade.The time setting is a strange one. It was set eleven years before its release date, which I'd have thought would not be long enough for it to be truly nostalgic to most people outside of George Lucas's age group (which includes most of the cast, since it invariably has the aged-almost-thirty high school graduates so prevalent in film and TV at the time). I recently watched Beautiful People, a short-lived TV sitcom which evidently failed in part because it was set only eleven years before real time (made in 2008 but set in 1997) and therefore neither truly nostalgic nor bang up-to-date. And there's nothing older than yesterday's news. These things don't really become time capsules until decades later, by which time it's too late, and it lacks the authenticity of something set in the time during which it's made. For these reasons I could be puzzled by America Graffiti's success at the time. Perhaps it reflects how much the Sixties were a time of change. Perhaps it's down to the strong support of those nostalgic twenty-somethings. Perhaps the themes are timeless enough to make it work even though it shouldn't Or it could be a combination of all three.I'd laboured under the misconception that the film was set almost entirely in and around a diner, rather than car cruising culture. I suppose it captured it well enough to hold my attention. With retrospect the film's influence on projects such as Grease or Happy Days can be seen, as well as contemporary set films such as Saturday Night Fever, Thank God It's Friday or some of the coming-of-age films in later decades from the likes of John Hughes.As I'd have expected, the performances are pretty good, the story (such as it is) engaging) and the aesthetics pleasant.The sound was another matter. This feels very much a jukebox film, where the vintage pop soundtrack is an important and evocative character. Sadly, this element is also where the film lost me. The sound design seemed quite poor, and much of the sometimes-muffled dialogue was lost among the lyrics, particularly in scenes such as the hop, where they clashed with very unpleasant results.Overall, I can see why this film is so well-regarded. Really, though, I view this more as a curiosity given the famous cast and crew. It didn't really speak to my heart. Perhaps it's a George Lucas thing.</blockquote>

Verification: What month follows July?