Motion Pictures American Graffiti - The Perfect Car Movie?

And a Three Musketeers !

 

Yes! You get it! American Graffiti happened to us damned near every time we left the house in high school. What other movie can you say that about? Star Wars? Towering inferno? Any other movie ever made? It was the perfect movie!

 

The only thing they didn't cover was changing a waterpump on my 64 impala ss while on a date. Went to my Dads and she never even got out of the car! Damn that sob was hot. LOL Luckily his place was only 1/2 mile from town where we were cruising. Everyone says 220 isn't hot. The hell it ain't!!!!

 

Wasn't there Beef Jerky in there somewhere???

 

I liked AG, but I can't say it was much of an influence. That had been handled by Grand Prix. Watching James Garner go through the gears, and the terrific race and pit scenes had already sealed that deal. AG was entertaining, but since I was already racing by that time the street seemed rather tame.

 

Hey guy's........ Paul (John Milner) LeMat..... Needs your help.... Please look at this featured post !

https://www.jalopyjournal.com/?p=51151

 

It looks like it was filmed in and around Thornville Ohio, east of Columbus, based on signage clues I saw.
As a native buckeye that's cool.

 

Saw it as a young boy in the 70’s....have loved it every since...one of the best memories I have is watching it with my Dad...he laughs his ass off when the cop pulls out and loses the rear end...always thought it was funny they mentioned a Midwestern guy, Darryl Starbird, instead of a California guy..and the Wolfman...come on...when I grow up I wanna be a Wolfman...

As much as I love it...Hollywood Knights does it for me..to this day me and friends quote lines from this movie...

both great movies of simpler...better times

 

AG was defiantly a movie that ingrained in my brain as a kid. With growing up in the 90s in a sea of the billet street rod craze, the movie just sucked me in with how the cars looked and the music was awesome. While the 32 and 55 were cool, it was that 58 Impala that did it for me. If a cool custom like that 58 with Toad behind the wheel could land a girl like that, well sign me up, lol.


I think also its kind of the reason I wanted Taboo back in the family so badly. It fit right into the time frame of the movie and was a killer custom in my eyes that I could feel like Toad. Although still haven't landed the girl.

 

The 32 and the 55 are my least favorite.
The merc,(as ugly as it is) and the 58, yep
Man that 58 is dang near perfect.

 

I saw AG at a theater when it first came out. Almost stood up in my seat when that yellow '32 coupe drove across the screen. I drove my '55 to see it. Still think it's a great movie. Still got my '55 too.

 

Collected these over the years @ West Coast NSRA shows in Bakersfield. They had the stars there signing autographs. It's my VHS box.

 

.............but hopefully you kept the ball point pen and beef jerky.

 

AG is entertaining but was nothing like my life in 1960's NE New Jersey...It was darker, more like Mad Max....lol...

 

“The lure of hot rod culture, of self expression through your car, of rebellion in your car, and growing up *with* your car. I’m not sure any other movie made before or since has fully captured what all that really means like George Lucas did with American Graffiti.”

American Graffiti is a 1973 American coming-of-age comedy drama film directed by George Lucas , produced by Francis Ford Coppola.


Hello,

Having owned a 58 Impala, lived in So Cal through the valuable teenage years, had a place to call our own hangout in Bixby Knolls with other teenage friends, and expanded our whole cruising grounds to include all of LA County and Orange County coastal areas, we had fun.
Thanks, @themoose
Wasn’t that what being a teenager and having hot rods/drag race experience was all about back then? It was 1957-68 when the whole world started to explode with major events happening all over the place. The era was shown in good detail in the movie. The drive-ins, there were plenty of them in almost every community. In our area, the hot spots were the center of activity for the different gatherings of teenagers living in their own section of the big city environment.

Some of its drag race scenes between the 55 and 32, could have been taken place in the empty highway in West Orange County. The one highway used daily by millions became an empty dragstrip, two miles long. The whole area was designed from overhead to pretend it was a community during the war era. Below the area in Seal Beach were ammunition storage bunkers designed to look like a neighborhood community.

Jnaki

The film did capture the essence of our teenage times and for the 1973-74 opening across the USA, showed the country how a portion of Hollywood could influence what we did as teenagers in real life. Yes, the movie was a huge hit and we were all happy it was made.

But, for our era, it was real and exciting at the time period of 1957 to 1968. The movie was good, but was not the whole world of events in hot rodding or drag racing. That had been going on for plenty of years. There were countless stories that came from those exciting times. By the time the movie was shown all across the country and world, time were changing and it became relevant for a few, but not the most important thing happening at those new troubling times of the decade from 69 to 79.

It is too bad that some that were so influenced by that movie had never seen the real life activities and that is awful. But to base hot rodding/drag racing on that movie as the pinnacle and base future happenings using that 1973 movie as a starting point is not right.

The movie captured one person’s viewpoint about growing up in the 50s-60s. But, every time someone uses American Graffiti as the major influence in hot rods/drag racing makes one laugh at the thought. It was not just from the Midwest or East, but in So Cal, too. The uninformed grabbed on to something and uses it for their center of reference.

George Lucas did a marvelous job of capturing his vision of a part of history. We are all glad he did. The movie seemed more real than those old Hollywood bad guy hot rod movies. But, that day and movie was not the essence of the development of hot rodding and drag racing in our histories. It was one way to enjoy some flashbacks to what was once a fleeting memory. YRMV

 

Probably thinking of ''Outrage"

 

Yes, it is just a joke.

 

In 1962, I was 10 years old, building model cars, ( sniffing glue), buying the 25 cent little books at Woodson's Market, and Service Drug, like Speed and Custom, Rodding and Restyling, all the east coast books, and watching the cool, older guys in the neighborhood with their cars. Sucked at sports, loved hot rods and customs. Saw AG while stoned when it came out. None of my friends would go see it again and again, so I had to invite other people to go with me each time.
None of the women around me have ever understood why there are certain movies that WILL BE WATCHED when they come on TV. Every time. Doesn't matter if I have it on DVD, I still watch them over and over.
American Graffiti, Hollywood Knights, Animal House, Blues Brothers, etc.
These movies can make a bad day good.

 

AG is still the best.

As an owner of a 58 Plymouth, and a horror buff, I'm also a fan of Christine.

Alright, alright, alright... When it comes to AG like moves, bump it a couple of decades and you get Dazed and Confused. Like AG it's full of great cars, has a great soundtrack, and features some young actors that would go on to become big stars. For me it's the one that hits closest to home. I grew up in a small town in South Texas, and graduated high school in 95. Even though it was almost 20 years after the setting in the movie, Dazed and Confused is still a good representation of my high school days.

 

LOL!!! Like you, Dazed and Confused also mimic's my mis spent youth, as I graduated in '93 from Hicksville, USA High School! We always seemed to be 20 years behind times, compared to the rest of the world, but God Damn, did we have fun!!! It was Dazed and Confused antic's with mid 70's to mid 80's car's and truck's and 90's fashion! The kegger's on the weekend's were EPIC!!! Sorry for the side track... Now back to our regularly scheduled programing...

 

Well, while probably an unpopular opinion on this site and I do love American Graffiti, but I think Grand Prix might be my favorite overall too. The real footage is crazy and groundbreaking for the time. Won three Oscars.

 

Well he didn't have change , so can you loan me a dollar?

 

Lol

 

We saw Dazed in the theater when it came out (I am also class of '93). I can't hear Sweet Emotion without thinking about that '70 Judge rolling the HS parking lot. They mixed that song really great in surround sound.

As far as AG is concerned, we would watch it every year wen it was on TV when I was a wee lad. Mom was into the music and culture, the cars did it for me (still like the music as well). It is still my favorite car movie (Dazed is a close 2nd).

 

^^^^^^ I Agree on ALL counts!!! ^^^^^^

 

My friends and I worshiped that movie. It's hilarious this thread came out right after I just did a presentation about my life called "American Graffiti; West Texas Edition."

We had so much of that movie taken to heart. There was once this knucklehead that kept trying to race my '55 was cruising next to me trying to start something... my friend Luis started in on him with Milner's lines from the Milner-Falfa "back n' forth". We were dying laughing that our "friend" was falling into it nearly word for word until he got so mad he tossed his coke at me ... sailing right over the car by a mile. I did end up blowing his doors off a few weekends later.... it was just a matter of time. And wouldn't you know, I had Booker T&the MG's Green Onions playing when the deed went down too.

Back in the days of cassettes, I must have worn out and had to buy new copies of the AG soundtrack three or four times (along with my Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley... Howlin Wolf... )

 

Just consider the audience. Most here think it's pronounced Grand Pricks....