More American Graffiti

There was no way More American Graffiti was going to be a great film. It was following up one of the most popular movies of the 70's. George Lucas was barely involved in the production. It had a messed up story that took place on 4 seperate New Years Eves. Considering all the things working against it, I suppose it's not all that bad. There are some great scenes, but there's also an equal amount of bad scenes. John Milner's story is fairly entertaining. Toad's Vietnam story is a lot of fun to watch. But the other two stories are mediocre at best. I guess you can say half of the movie works, and the other half doesn't. Parts of the film are very funny. The highlights being Toad's attempts to get out of the Vietnam War, and Harrison Ford's cameo as a traffic cop. As a huge fan of the original American Graffiti, I got some enjoyment out of seeing all the characters again. But for most people, More American Graffiti will probably feel like a waste of time.

'More American Graffiti' is a worthy follow up to it's predecessor 'American Graffit' Back again for this episodic slice of sixties nostalgia is Paul Le Mat as Drag racer John Milner and his racing exploits and the cute subplot involving the 'Swedish girl'

Bo Hopkin's and Charles Martin Smith's Exploits in Vietnam and Smith's recurring methods to get sent home are hilarious but ultimately tragic.

Ron Howard's marriage which is verging on break up amid the draft burning riots.

the ever likable Candy Clark's exploits as a go-go dancer in San Francisco and her 'Trips' Look out for Harrison Ford as a quick Cameo as a Traffic Cop.

From a technical standpoint 'More American Garffiti' is an interesting film as the film 'experiments' with Aspect Ratio's for instance the Vietnam sequences are 16mm 1.37 : 1 Candy Clarks San Francisco exploits are a mixture of 2.35 : 1 with 'Woodstock' like split screen effects. Ron Howards scenes are 1.85 : 1 it is an admittedly distracting effect but it makes for an interesting viewing.

I'm guessing a lot of folks that have complained about the split screen in MAG kid of missed yet another bit of cleverness that seemed to fly over the heads of a lot of viewers.

Each section (year) is shot in a different manner to make a secondary visual comment. The Vietnam stuff is all shot on 16mm, hand-held and grainy as hell to simulate the stuff we were watching on the nightly news back then.

Milner's sequences are shot in super widescreen, Debbie's stuff is split screen, sped up, slowed down - your basic "statement" crap from the late 60's and Ron Howard's happy home life is shot with the over-lit, over-tailored feel of a "mainstream" comedy ala Doris Day/Bob Hope circa 1965.

Personally, I found it amusing.

..this sequel is actually pretty good, the different film style for each segment works (especially the hand held camera style for the viet nam segment)...I'd rather watch this than most of the crap lucas puts out these days ...milner's character was fleshed out a bit more here from the first film, and to good effect ...my only complaint is that each segment feels like it should be a year later than the date indicated on screen (eg....no one in 1966 San Francisco would have ANY idea who Jimi Hendrix was, and those student protests on campus were more common AFTER 1967)

"American Graffiti" while overpraised, is certainly one of the best films of the early 70s. It made tons of money and jump-started the careers of many stars. So, naturally they made a sequel--but why? At the end of the original it told us what happened to the main characters--there was absolutely no surprises here. That being said it's an OK movie.

The different types of screen sizes are nice--70mm for the race car sequences; small, hand-held for the Vietnam sequences; multiple screens for Candy Clark and the hippies and regular size screen for Howard and Williams "normal" couple. But, storywise, there was nothing new here and the different screen sizes can only hold you interest for a while. It was just an average movie--but a big let-down from the original. This was not a big hit when it was released--it disappeared quickly.

This is mostly a forgotten movie--as it should stay.