"Dazed and Confused" - how close was that to real 70's suburban life?

[absyntheNsugar]

I was a child of the 80's who always looked at the 70's as kind of the glory days...

So how close was this movie to 70's suburban reality?

[elfwitch]

1. I remember it like that or at least close to that...

My uncle and I won tickets on the radio to see KISS in '76.
I remember the clothes and the music being very much like that.

[GOPisEvil]

2. I can't tell you that...but I can tell you some of those landmarks remain!

Top Notch Burgers still cranks out damn fine milk shakes and burgers! :9

Now that I live here in Austin, it's fun trying to spot all the stuff in the movie.

[Dogmudgeon]

3. Dazed OR Confused

Clothing -- 80% accurate
Hairstyles -- very close
Music -- dead-on
Dope -- not everybody smoked, and not nearly that much
Booze -- yep
High school hazing spankings -- in your dreams!

--bkl

[Fight_n_back]

4. Almost like a documentary

I even had a friend with that same "first punch" theory. I had to dive in and save him...

[Khephra]

5. Heck, it was pretty close to my early 80's teenage years

[GOPisEvil]

7. Yeah - it resembled the early 80's here in TX, too.

Before the "Me Generation" crap took hold fully.

[absyntheNsugar]

9. Interesting....I was a late 80's kid myself

And some of us lived this kind of teenage life, but the majority of kids in mid-to-late 80's Suburban California lived a more John Hughes type life...except they did a lot of coke and no dope.

In fact I remember one of my preppy friends was trying to convince me that coke was better for you than dope.

[Khephra]

11. Well, I lived in a rural area in the early 80's

so we weren't so quick to change back then. The 70's lingered on until late in the 80's in some rural areas.

Then there's my hometown of Centerville, IN, which was stuck in the 50's into the 70's and 80's.

[vi5]

6. I was in grade school then but from what I remember...

..and my memory is pretty good.....it was very accurate.

My dad was young and he had a lot of cousins who were only about 5-10 years older than me and were teenagers in the 70's and that movie is exactly how I remember them all being.

[supernova]

8. It's pretty scary

in it's accurateness. Want proof? Just open up any yearbook circa 1977 and you'll see what I mean. LOL!

[sonias]

10. The football being king in Texas is still true

I'm sure the hazing part is true at least for the 70s. I don't know how much of that still goes on, but frats at the University of Texas are always getting caught doing it, so I'm guessing it still does go on in the Texas suburbs.

And on music and drugs, well that's true in urban and suburban areas. Hell this is TX what do you expect, that we should live here in unaltered reality?

Great little film Linklater did. It's a great period piece. Matthew McConaughey's role is great, but did you spot Renee Zellweger in it?

Sonia

[xcentrik]

12. very close indeed.

We didn't have the senior/freshman hazings, but except for that it's the closest approximation of my own adolescence (Louisville, KY, mid 70's) I have ever seen in a movie.

[supernova]

13. It's a great soundtrack

if you get the soundtrack to the movie, it's an almost dead perfect 70s complilation CD.

[geniph]

14. I graduated in 1977

(the movie's set in 1976) and the only part that didn't ring true for me was the hazing stuff. The parties in the park - yeah, I remember that VERY well. That redheaded girl who hangs out with the geeky guys? That was me. Except I wouldn't have gone off with the creepy older guy who hangs around high school girls; I'd have stayed with my nerd friends.

The other movie that rang true in many ways for me was Fast Times at Ridgemont High - I was one of the kids tumbling out of Spicoli's van.

[Nlighten1]

15. I went to high school with Parker Posey.

Except then her name was Missy Posey. Her Dad owns a car dealership in Laurel. MS.

[put out]

16. My friends and I weren't as gorgeous as the cast,

but the creators were pretty close to capturing my suburban teen-age wasteland on film.

I need to watch that again. My teen-age son can watch all the fake violence he wants, but he isn't seeing that movie until he's 21. I can imagine the questions, starting with something about the cars, the hair, the clothes, the slang, the driving around, and narrowing it down to the sex, the alcohol, the dope...

[davsand]

17. We didn't have hazing, but it WAS illustrative of my life.

I graduated from High School in '78 and this was set in '77 so there was a lot of it that hit me dead on. We were close to a university and I expect maybe it made us a bit more chemical than we might have been otherwise, but the booze use and the whole social structure was dead on.

My school had distinct "classes" or categories of kids and it was illustrated pretty well in that movie. "Jocks" could be "dopers" but they were never "grits" (AKA white trash or gritty nasty kids). Geeks have always been geeks...

From the keggers in the local woods to the endless driving around--it was all part of my life in that time frame. That opening sequence of the car driving thru the parking lot with Sweet Emotion blasting away just brought back TOO many memories.


Laura

[tigereye]

18. hair and some of the clothes were right

but no one wore pants with vertical stripes that was late 60's. Never saw a trunk full of beer...the necking seemed right though.

[Ellen Forradalom]

19. As a 70s teenager, I must tell you

that your longing for the 70s is entirely misplaced.

[absyntheNsugar]

20. Well we always want what we don't have

the other day my cousin was pining for a teenage life in the 80's. She went on about how the music was so good, and how everyone acted cool back then. You see, she's a sixteen year old who was raised on John Hughes and Cory Feldman movies.

For me, the 80's were nothing more than a sharp U-turn from progress....