American Graffiti Certificate: 
- Duration:
- 112 mins
- Year produced:
- 1973
- Director:
- George Lucas
- Cast:
- Richard Dreyfuss
- Ron Howard
- Paul Le Mat
A bittersweet comedy following several recently graduated high school students (including future stars Richard Dreyfuss and Ron Howard) for one last summer night of drag racing and picking up girls in 1962 small-town America. Expertly weaving the hits of the day into the action, director George Lucas brilliantly evokes the end of an era (partly based on his own rock and roll, hot-rodding youth) and the end of innocence for a pre-Vietnam generation. He would go on to direct Star Wars - but some people believe he’s never again captured the warmth and humour of American Graffiti.
- Average rating:
(1 votes)
Fascinating facts
After the success of 'Easy Rider' (1969), Universal Studios hit upon the idea to let young filmmakers make "semi-independent" films for low budgets in hopes of generating similar profits. The idea was to make five movies for low budgets (one million dollars or less), not interfere in the filmmaking process, and give the directors final cut. However Universal did interfere, and made George Lucas make modifications to the original cut. He got back at them after Star Wars was released, and re-instated the cut scenes.
In his cameo as lone hot-rodder Bob Falfa, the young Harrison Ford made his first real impact on the silver screen after years of bit parts - not least because of his distinctive white cowboy hat. But Ford only wore the hat in the first place after refusing George Lucas’ request that he cut his long hair into a style more appropriate to the early 60s.