1FF Film Club - COMING OF AGE

[Craig]

Eight nominations for this one.

Blue Is the Warmest Colour (2013)
Adèle's life is changed when she meets Emma, a young woman with blue hair, who will allow her to discover desire and to assert herself as a woman and as an adult. In front of others, Adele grows, seeks herself, loses herself, and ultimately finds herself through love and loss.

Kids (1995)
A day in the life of a group of teens as they travel around New York City skating, drinking, smoking, and deflowering virgins.

The Myth of the American Sleepover (2010)
Four young people navigate the suburban wonderland of metro-Detroit looking for love and adventure on the last weekend of summer.

Stand by Me (1986)
After the death of a friend, a writer recounts a boyhood journey to find the body of a missing boy.

 

[Craig]

Dazed and Confused (1993)
The adventures of high school and junior high students on the last day of school in May 1976.

Crooklyn (1994)
From Spike Lee comes this vibrant semi-autobiographical portrait of a school-teacher, her stubborn jazz-musician husband and their five kids living in '70s Brooklyn.

Varsity Blues (1999)
A back-up quarterback is chosen to lead a Texas football team to victory after the star quarterback is injured.

Diner (1982)
A group of college-age buddies struggle with their imminent passage into adulthood in 1959 Baltimore.

 

[Craig]

Setting a deadline of midnight Sunday for voting on this.

 

[Benito]

The Last Picture Show - 1971
American Graffiti - 1973

 

[Craig]

We have a winner.

Dazed and Confused (1993) - http://gb.imdb.com/title/tt0106677/

https://www.justwatch.com/uk/movie/dazed-and-confused <<--- Thank you to our very own Ian for bringing this to my attention, what is easily his greatest (and indeed only) contribution to film club so far.

Enjoy.

 

[Martino Knockavelli]

Watched this. I'd not seen it before.

I can understand why a lot of folks love it. It's a big cinematic madeleine, it has a rambling/loose shaggy dog cool to it, it possesses in spades the ring of truth and verisimilitude that either makes or breaks these sorts of films, the performances are great across the board in an unaffected sort of a way, it's poised between sincerity and self-awareness in an accomplished manner, it's simultaneously familiar and pleasingly unpredictable.

But it's not really for me. The nostalgia it trades in is for experiences foreign to me, obviously in setting, but also in doing that sort of thing when you were ~17 years old. I spent a lot of the film pondering how these people are mostly dicks who I would never have wanted to associate with. Which I suspect is at least somewhat of the point, but still.

I was not charmed by it in the way that I was American Sleepover, say, which I suspect might not exist without it. I wonder if there is a distinction between that film focussing on the awkwardness and hesitations, and this one focussing (mostly) on the stoner cool dudes, and between that one's subtle poetry and this one's stoner slacker vibe.

I also had a horrifying revelation about halfway thru that Kevin Smith owes his entire career to this film. Which is not the film's fault, but even so…

Sorry SoC.

 

[Aber gas]

At its heart it's kinda patriotic and cute in it's innocence. The characters have their safely defined social status and that's just about it. I like the film though, it's easy to watch probably because it doesn't really deal with the horrible awkwardness and alienation that is dealt with in films like Heathers or pump up the volume.

 

[Craig]

The fact it's an easy watch is one of the things that I love about it. Linklater said something along the lines of he didn't want to have the film culminate in some awful set piece such as someone dying in order to bring his characters crashing into adulthood. It's an ode to the stupidity of youth that is undeniably easy to dismiss as light hearted fun without delving into the more serious undertone of the film.

Pretty much all the characters are headed down a road they don't truly want to be on. Be it McConaughey's cool cult icon Wooderson, who is in fact a bit of a joke clinging onto the glory of his high school days and hanging out with a crowd that is becoming ever more younger than him with each passing year. London's star football player who doesn't even really want to play football but is kind of shunted into that position by an expectant community and classmates. Then all the inevitably hopeless characters inbetween from Cochrane's archetypal stoner and Affleck's meathead jock held back a year down to the 'geek' crowd who in essence know that this world is a fleeting episode of their lives but still want to be involved.

I think it's a much more serious look at a period in life that at the time is given way much more emphasis than it truly deserves in the grand scheme of things and I think (and indeed hope) that was ultimately Linklater's aim. The fact he manages to do it so subtly is I think the films greatest triumph.

 

[Aber gas]

The fact it's an easy watch is one of the things that I love about it. Linklater said something along the lines of he didn't want to have the film culminate in some awful set piece such as someone dying in order to bring his characters crashing into adulthood. It's an ode to the stupidity of youth that is undeniably easy to dismiss as light hearted fun without delving into the more serious undertone of the film.

Pretty much all the characters are headed down a road they don't truly want to be on. Be it McConaughey's cool cult icon Wooderson, who is in fact a bit of a joke clinging onto the glory of his high school days and hanging out with a crowd that is becoming ever more younger than him with each passing year. London's star football player who doesn't even really want to play football but is kind of shunted into that position by an expectant community and classmates. Then all the inevitably hopeless characters inbetween from Cochrane's archetypal stoner and Affleck's meathead jock held back a year down to the 'geek' crowd who in essence know that this world is a fleeting episode of their lives but still want to be involved.

I think it's a much more serious look at a period in life that at the time is given way much more emphasis than it truly deserves in the grand scheme of things and I think (and indeed hope) that was ultimately Linklater's aim. The fact he manages to do it so subtly is I think the films greatest triumph.

It's not as good as Kids tho

 

[Stagat]

Seen this a couple of times before. First time was years ago when I just caught it on telly, didn't know what it was, but thought it looked cool so I watched it.

It looked cool was my overriding memory. I didn't look up the name of it afterwards (wasn't worth firing up the dial-up) and for years I didn't know what it was I'd watched. Some time later I saw people talking about some film online and realised it was the one I'd seen and it was meant to be some sort of classic. So I watched it again.

And again, I thought it looked cool. But that's about it. Maybe all the stuff Craig talks about was too subtle for me. I understand the bloke's unwillingness to have a big set piece ending as Craig also says but both times I saw it I felt like I'd watched most of a film that looked great but I'd somehow skipped to the credits before the end. I just don't think enough happens.

I can see why people (claim to) like it but I imagine it's for the style over the substance for some.

 

[SALTIRE]

Looking this out tonight, but won't probably see until tomorrow night. Looks a decent flick though.