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Dazed and Confused
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Richard Linklater
Produced by	Sean Daniel James Jacks Richard Linklater
Written by	Richard Linklater
Starring	Jason London Rory Cochrane Wiley Wiggins Sasha Jenson Michelle Burke Adam Goldberg Anthony Rapp Matthew McConaughey Marissa Ribisi Shawn Andrews Cole Hauser Milla Jovovich Joey Lauren Adams Ben Affleck Parker Posey Nicky Katt Christin Hinojosa Esteban Powell
Music by	Various Artists
Cinematography	Lee Daniel
Editing by	Sandra Adair
Distributed by	Universal Pictures
Release date(s)	September 24, 1993
Running time	103 min.
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$2 million
Gross revenue	$7,993,039
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

Dazed and Confused is a 1993 comedy-drama film written and directed by Richard Linklater. The movie's large ensemble cast featured a number of future stars including Ben Affleck, Anthony Rapp, Cole Hauser, Milla Jovovich, Joey Lauren Adams, and Parker Posey.

The film took in no more than $8 million at the U.S. box office, but in recent years has achieved cult film status. Quentin Tarantino included it on his list of the twelve greatest films of all time in voting in the 2002 Sight and Sound.^[1] It also ranked third on Entertainment Weekly's list of the 50 Best High School Movies. ^[2]

The title of the film is derived from the Led Zeppelin song of the same name.^[3] Linklater approached members of the band for permission to use some of their songs in the movie but, although Jimmy Page agreed, Robert Plant refused.^[4]

Contents 1 Plot 2 Cast 3 Themes 4 Reception 5 Soundtracks 5.1 Dazed and Confused Soundtrack (1993) 5.2 Even More Dazed and Confused Soundtrack (1994) 6 Book 7 Criterion Collection DVD 8 Reunions of cast members 9 Lawsuit 10 See also 11 References 12 External links

The film takes place on May 28, 1976, the last day of school at Lee High School in Austin, Texas. The seniors are preparing for the annual hazing of incoming freshmen by building paddles and buying cooking supplies; meanwhile, Randall "Pink" Floyd, the school's star football player, is asked to sign a school pledge, promising not to take drugs or do anything else that could "jeopardize the goal of a championship season in '76". When classes end, the freshman boys are hunted down by the senior boys for paddling while the freshman girls are rounded up in a parking lot, covered in condiments, forced to propose to senior boys, and taken through a car wash. During this time, freshman Sabrina strikes a chord with senior Tony.

A major evening plan is ruined when Pickford's parents discover that he is planning to host a keg party that night. Meanwhile, freshman Mitch is violently paddled by the seniors, most of all by O'Bannion, the nastiest and dumbest of the class. Mitch gets a ride home with Pink, who is shown to be sympathetic and offers to take Mitch riding with the others that night. Meanwhile, Tony drives around with his friends Cynthia and Mike, who is uncertain about what to do after high school. Mitch rides with Pink and Wooderson, who graduated years ago but still hangs out with high schoolers.

The three of them stop at the Emporium, a popular pool hall. Mitch is introduced to sophomore Julie, and they seem to be mutually attracted to each other. Mitch goes driving again with some of the seniors. They play mailbox baseball and pretend to steal beer, but an owner of one of the mailboxes catches them and threatens them with a gun before they escape. They return to the Emporium, where Mitch meets up with his freshmen friends. They come up with a plan to get revenge on O'Bannion and dump paint on him in front of everybody else.

A new keg party is planned at one of the Austin Moontowers, which attracts essentially the entire senior class and several of the freshmen. Mike has a confrontation with tough guy Clint while Tony meets up with Sabrina again and Cynthia exchanges phone numbers with Wooderson. Ben confronts Pink about his refusal to sign the pledge but he is still unsure, believing it violates students' privacy and lifestyles. Mike picks a fight with Clint but ends up getting beaten-up and humiliated. Mitch runs into Julie and they hit it off again, and are later shown making out. Tony offers Sabrina a ride home, and kisses her when he drops her off at her house.

As night turns to dawn, Pink, Wooderson, Don, Slater, Simone and Shavonne smoke on the school football field, which the police soon notice. The school football coach is called and tells Pink that his friends are part of a bad crowd. Pink throws the pledge at the coach and leaves with his friends to get tickets to an Aerosmith concert. Meanwhile, Mitch arrives home at sunrise but his mother decides to go easy on him. The film ends with Pink and his friends driving on a highway.

• Jason London as Randall "Pink" Floyd
• Rory Cochrane as Ron Slater
• Wiley Wiggins as Mitch Kramer
• Sasha Jenson as Don Dawson
• Michelle Burke as Jodi Kramer
• Adam Goldberg as Mike Newhouse
• Anthony Rapp as Tony Olson
• Matthew McConaughey as David Wooderson
• Marissa Ribisi as Cynthia Dunn
• Shawn Andrews as Kevin Pickford
• Cole Hauser as Benny O'Donnell
• Milla Jovovich as Michelle Burroughs
• Joey Lauren Adams as Simone Kerr
• Ben Affleck as Fred O'Bannion
• Parker Posey as Darla Marks
• Nicky Katt as Clint Bruno
• Christin Hinojosa as Sabrina Davis
• Esteban Powell as Carl Burnett

The film's overarching themes involve angst-ridden teenagers bristling at authority, coming of age stories and anomie. These themes are played out in various ways across the film's major characters.

• Mitch and Sabrina are both transitioning from middle school to high school, and transitioning away from their younger groups of friends to an older, more sophisticated group. Both characters also make their first romantic connections, and both with older characters.
• Pink resists the pressure from his peers, authority figures and citizens in town and refuses to sign the pledge.
• Cynthia, Tony and Mike have several conversations about where they see themselves going in life.
• Cynthia transitions from a platonic relationship with her male friends to a potential sexual relationship with Wooderson.
• O'Bannion is accused of failing his senior year of high school specifically so he can prey on and continue to haze younger high school students.
• Wooderson and Don both have monologues that outline the characters' rejection of the ordinary, adult culture that surrounds them. Wooderson disparages the idea of pursuing higher education, preferring instead to work a steady job with the city that provides him the means to continue hanging out with high-schoolers, while Don proclaims that his only goal is to have as much fun as possible while he is stuck in high school.
• Wooderson also advises Pink that the pledge he is being asked to sign is merely the first of similar accommodations to authority he will be asked to make throughout his life.

It's notable that the film's release coincided with the rising popularity of grunge music, which was significantly influenced by 70s rock featured in the film, and the popular notion of teenagers in the seventies as a "lost generation." The film offered up comparisons and contrasts between slacker culture in the early 90s and late 70s culture.

When the film was first released on September 24th, 1993, it was not one of the most prominent or talked-about films of the year, and not many critics were bothered to review it. Indeed, in the years since the film's release, only 42 reviews have been counted on website Rotten Tomatoes. Still, of those reviews, only one is negative, and the film has achieved the status of a cult classic over the years. Roger Ebert awarded the film three stars out of four, praising the film as "art crossed with anthropology" with a "painful underside."^[5]

1. Rock and Roll, Hoochie Koo - Rick Derringer
2. Slow Ride - Foghat
3. School's Out - Alice Cooper
4. Jim Dandy - Black Oak Arkansas
5. Tush - ZZ Top
6. Love Hurts - Nazareth
7. Stranglehold - Ted Nugent
8. Cherry Bomb - The Runaways
9. Fox on the Run - Sweet
10. Low Rider - War
11. Tuesday's Gone - Lynyrd Skynyrd
12. Highway Star - Deep Purple
13. Rock and Roll All Nite - KISS
14. Paranoid - Black Sabbath

1. Free Ride - Edgar Winter Group
2. No More Mr. Nice Guy - Alice Cooper
3. Livin' In The USA - The Steve Miller Band
4. Never Been Any Reason - Head East
5. Why Can't We Be Friends? - War
6. Summer Breeze - Seals and Crofts
7. Right Place, Wrong Time - Dr. John
8. Balinese - ZZ Top
9. Lord Have Mercy On My Soul - Black Oak Arkansas
10. I Just Want to Make Love to You - Foghat
11. Show Me the Way - Peter Frampton
12. Do You Feel Like We Do - Peter Frampton

In September of 1993, St. Martin's Press published a 127-page, softcover book (ISBN #0-312-09466-3) that was inspired by the screenplay by Richard Linklater and compiled by Richard Linklater, Denise Montgomery and others. It was presented as a kind of yearbook that contained essays written by characters from the film as well as profiles on the characters, a timeline focusing on the years 1973 to 1977 and various 1970s pop culture charts and quizzes. It also featured dozens of black-and-white photos from the film. It is said to be based on the happenings at Stephen F. Austin High School in Austin, Texas.

Some of the material contained in the original 1993 book was reprinted in the 72-page book included with the Criterion DVD release in 2006.

A two-disc Criterion Collection boxed-set edition was released on June 6, 2006, in the USA and Canada only. The set features an audio commentary by Richard Linklater, deleted scenes, the original trailer, the 50 minute "Making Dazed" documentary that aired on the American Movie Classics channel on September 18, 2005, on-set interviews, behind-the-scenes footage, cast auditions and footage from the ten-year anniversary celebration. Also included is a 72-page book featuring new essays by Kent Jones, Jim DeRogatis, and Chuck Klosterman as well as memories from the cast and crew, character profiles (as seen in the original 1993 book) and a mini reproduction of the original film poster designed by Frank Kozik.

The film has also been released on HD DVD.

• In the movie Empire Records, a Dazed and Confused sticker can be seen on the cash register. Rory Cochrane and Renee Zellweger appeared in both films.
• Ben Affleck and Joey Lauren Adams would reunite on screen a number of times in Kevin Smith's movies, including Mallrats, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, and Chasing Amy, in the latter of which they both had lead roles. Coincidentally, the first movie they had roles in, Mallrats, starred Jeremy London, Jason London's twin brother. Affleck would also reunite with Nicky Katt in the films Phantoms and Boiler Room, and with Cole Hauser in Good Will Hunting, which was co-written by Affleck.
• Adam Goldberg and Anthony Rapp are once again cast together in the Academy award winning film, A Beautiful Mind, as colleagues of the main character, John Nash, played by Russell Crowe.
• The pinball machine in the Emporium can also be seen in Richard Linklater's film Waking Life, which stars Wiley Wiggins; Nicky Katt and Adam Goldberg also appear in the film.
• Nicky Katt and Parker Posey appear in Linklater's film SubUrbia.
• Matthew McConaughey and Adam Goldberg star together in Edtv and How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days.

• In October 2004, three of Linklater's former classmates, whose surnames are Wooderson, Slater, and Floyd, filed a defamation lawsuit against Linklater, claiming to be the basis for the similarly named characters on the film. The lawsuit was filed in New Mexico rather than Texas because New Mexico has a longer statute of limitations^[6]

• Almost Famous (2000)
• Detroit Rock City (1999)

• Dazed and Confused at the Internet Movie Database
• Dazed and Confused at All Movie Guide
• Dazed and Confused at Rotten Tomatoes

v • d • e Films directed by Richard Linklater
It's Impossible to Learn to Plow by Reading Books (1989) • Slacker (1991) • Dazed and Confused (1993) • Before Sunrise (1995) • subUrbia (1996) • The Newton Boys (1998) • Waking Life (2001) • Tape (2001) • School of Rock (2003) • Before Sunset (2004) • Bad News Bears (2005) • A Scanner Darkly (2006) • Fast Food Nation (2006)