Dazed and Confused

1) Relate what was discussed in class or the text to the screening.

Richard Linklater is for sure one of the best directors and story tellers since the 1990’s. He does an excellent job of taking stories with very little or no plot and making them interesting. He knows how to create characters that appear realistic but also have their very own unique personality. Dazed and Confused, Boyhood, and Slacker are three of his more popular movies that follow the idea of telling a story without much of a plot. Dazed and Confused follows a group of high school students on the last day of school, and while it’s a highly entertaining movie there is little very little plot compared to many typical Hollywood movies. A similar concept is used in Slacker, as well as Linklater’s latest film Boyhood. Both films follow a similar story structure without much of a plot but in the case of Boyhood and Dazed and Confused, Linklater does an amazing job of telling his stories through the development and growth of his characters. Linklater also has the great ability to make his dialogue sound very natural which makes the movie very easy to relate to as an audience.

2) Find a related article (on the film, director, studio, actor/actress, artistic content, etc.) and summarize the content.

The article from The Hollywood Reporter titled “Richard Linklater Spills Secrets on His Films, From 'Dazed and Confused' to 'Boyhood'”, discusses some of Linklater’s more well known works and how he became the director that he is today. Linklater made his first experimental film in 1991 called Slacker. The movie does not really have an actual plot but it was made on an extremely small budget of only $23,000 and is now seen as a cult classic. That led Linklater to his next film Dazed and Confused. Linklater included a lot from his personal life in Dazed and Confused as he would have been 16 years old at the time when the movie took place. Dazed and Confused is a little more structured than Slacker but still lacks a traditional plot line that most movies have. "I've largely replaced the notion of conventional story with a time structure," says Linklater. Dazed and Confused was not instantly recognized by critics and audiences but quickly gained a following once it was released on video. Linklater’s overall success from Dazed and Confused let him to work on future movies such as Before Sunrise, Waking Life, Scanner Darkly and his most recent Boyhood, which all follow loose story structures and reasonably low budgets. Even though his movies appear to have lose stories, Linklater focuses a lot on getting the movie right on the script first which he thinks gives his films a lot more structure than many people think. Linklater has his own style of writing and directing and it the reason why he has been able to make so many unique pieces.

3) Apply the article to the film screened in class.

The article from The Hollywood Reporter which summarizes Linlater’s more memorable films and gives insight to him as a director. Linklater’s style is definitely apparent in his 1993 film Dazed and Confused. Dazed and Confused has a fairly lose plot line as do many of Linklater’s other films. Even though there is little plot in the film, the final product was most likely very similar to the original script that Linklater wrote. The article definitely supported my current opinion of Linklater as a writer and director. In my opinion he is one of the great auteur style directors of our time. He knows how to create these great stories that may be based off of true events or personal stories and he knows how to put the thoughts from his mind onto the screen. He is a visionary in the true literal sense of the word, and Dazed and Confused makes that very apparent. Linklater was able to take some of his own personal experiences from high school in the 1970’s and capture them with a great cast of characters.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/richard-linklater-spills-secrets-his-757621

4) Write a critical analysis of the film, including your personal opinion, formed as aresult of the screening, class discussions, text material and the article.

Richard Linklater’s film Dazed and Confused, sheds a light on what it was like to be a teenager in Texas in the 70’s. The film has a great set of characters, and without them the movie would be nothing. Even though the film takes place in the 70’s, many of the themes and events that take place in the film can apply to teenagers from any time period. One of the other reasons why the film is so great is because it is such a good hangout movie. The dialogue between the characters is so smooth and natural that at times when watching the movie you feel like you are actually with the characters in each scene. The also does a great job of not singling out any particular group or clique, when watching the film as an audience you get to learn about all the different groups that make up a school as a whole. You see the freshman, misfits, stoners, and jocks all interacting in one place, giving you the feeling of what it what be like to be at that school. Lastly, one of the biggest reasons why the characters are developed so well is because of the script that was written by Linklater. The banter back and forth between characters makes the movie flow very well and the comments he makes on school and authority figures reassures you what life would have been like growing up in the 70’s. Overall, Linklater’s film is a cult classic and I think will forever be seen as a movie that defines what it’s like being a teenager in the 1970’s. 

CHECKLIST FOR PLAGIARISM 1) ( x) I have not handed in this assignment for any

other class. 2) ( x) If I reused any information from other papers I have written for other

classes, I clearly explain that in the paper. 3) (x ) If I used any passages word for word, I

put quotations around those words, or used indentation and citation within the text. 4) (

x) I have not padded the bibliography. I have used all sources cited in the bibliography in

the text of the paper. 5) ( x) I have cited in the bibliography only the pages I personally

read. 6) (x ) I have used direct quotations only in cases where it could not be stated in

another way. I cited the source within the paper and in the bibliography. 7) (x ) I did not

so over-use direct quotations that the paper lacks interpretation or originality. 8) (x ) I

checked yes on steps 1-7 and therefore have been fully transparent about the research and

ideas used in my paper.

Name: _____Joe Katulak_______________ Date: __3/31/15________