50 years ago, ‘American Graffiti’ showed ’70s audiences a simpler time

“Where Were You in ’62?”

So went the tagline for George Lucas’ seminal coming-of-age nostalgia comedy/drama “American Graffiti,” which was released in August 1973, becoming a surprise blockbuster hit with an enormous and lasting cultural footprint.

That’s right: “American Graffiti” is 50. Rock that around your clock.

Ahead of the classic’s return to theaters for screenings Sunday and Wednesday (see www.fathomevents.com for details), let’s take a look at some of the elements that contributed to the massive success of “Graffiti” (which was almost titled “Rock Around the Block” or “Another Slow Night in Modesto,” and thank goodness it wasn’t), and a few things you might want to look for if you’re watching it for the first time or giving it another spin for nostalgia’s sake.

• Loosely based on George Lucas’ experiences in Modesto, California, with various characters representing different stages of Lucas’ younger life, “American Graffiti” was set in 1962, which many consider the spiritual end of the 1950s. In the months and years to follow, America experienced the Cuban Missile Crisis, the assassination of JFK, the Vietnam War, the counterculture movement, the assassination of MLK, the moon landing, etc., etc. In that same vein, the film’s release in 1973 coincides with the spiritual end of the 1960s. The period piece setting and the timing of the release were just perfect.
• It’s hard to overstate the impact of the “American Graffiti” double LP soundtrack. Along with “Easy Rider” (1969), this is one of the early examples of a film that eschewed a traditional film score and instead used existing songs. Even though the film is set in 1962, only 10 of the songs on the soundtrack were from the early 1960s; the rest were 1950s classics such as “Rock Around the Clock,” “That’ll Be the Day,” “Why Do Fools Fall in Love” and “The Great Pretender.” (This is in keeping with the theme of “American Graffiti” being more about the end of the 1950s than the dawn of the 1960s.) Still, so much had transpired in our world that the relatively short, 11-year span between the time when the story is set and the release of the film seems vast. (A similarly themed film premiering in 2023 might feature songs such as “Low” by Flo Rida featuring T-Pain, “Don’t Stop the Music” by Rihanna, “Poker Face” by Lady Gaga, “Boom Boom Pow” by The Black Eyed Peas and Taylor Swift’s “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together.” Doesn’t feel quite so … generational, does it?)

Soundtracks became all the rage in the 1970s and 1980s, thanks to the triple-platinum “American Graffiti” and the enormous success of the “Saturday Night Fever” soundtrack, which was a huge hit before the film was even released, not to mention “Grease,” “Urban Cowboy,” “Flashdance,” “The Big Chill,” “Purple Rain,” “Footloose” and “Dirty Dancing.” In 1980, 17 of the top 80 pop hits on the Billboard charts were songs from movie soundtracks.

• Virtually every song heard in “American Graffiti” is “diegetic music,” which means it’s heard by the characters, usually on their car radios. There’s no traditional film score or original film music. (Because the licensing costs of the original recordings were relatively expensive, there was no money left for any other type of music.) Throughout the course of that one long night, XERB 1090 AM Radio overnight DJ Wolfman Jack (played by … Wolfman Jack) provides the instant soundtrack for the events that transpire.

Universal Pictures

• Although the story is set in Modesto, the majority of filming actually took place in Petaluma, California, as Lucas felt his old hometown had changed too much and Petaluma better reflected the early 1960s vibe. Filming also took place in San Rafael (the city council withdrew permits after one day), San Francisco, Sonoma and the Buchanan Air Field in Concord.
• Harrison Ford didn’t want to have an era-appropriate flat-top haircut lest he be offered other movie or TV roles set in the “present day” of the 1970s, so a compromise was reached: the cocky street racer Bob Falfa would wear a Stetson. (You can see Ford’s floppy, 1970s hair late in the movie, as a rattled Bob watches his wrecked car burning.)
• Studio execs felt “American Graffiti” might be better served as a TV movie, but Francis Ford Coppola stepped in and agreed to be a producer on the film, which meant the ad campaign could include the line, “From the man who gave you ‘The Godfather.’ ”
• The T-shirt worn by Mackenzie Phillips’ Carol is from Dewey Weber Surfboards. Lucas had Phillips wear the shirt backwards, with the large logo on the front and the pocket logo on the back.
• During the famous stunt when a chain is attached to the police car’s rear axle, you can catch a glimpse of a theater marquee advertising “Dementia 13,” Coppola’s directorial debut, which actually didn’t come out until 1963. In that same vein, the bright yellow 1932 Ford Standard Coupe with the Chevy small-block 327 V-8 engine driven by Paul Le Mat’s John Milner has the license plate of THX138, a nod to Lucas’ first film, the sci-fi thriller “THX-1138.”

Universal Pictures

• For all its humor and street race action, “American Graffiti” also carries an air of melancholy. Early on, when Richard Dreyfuss’ Curt expresses reservations about going to college in the East, Ron Howard’s Steve references the supposedly cool Milner in his hot rod and says, “You want to end up like John? You just can’t stay 17 forever.”

Then there’s the end title cards, which tell us that Steve, the one who had the George Bailey-esque dream of getting out of “this turkey town” and never looking back, wound up as an insurance salesman in … Modesto, meaning he never left. John Milner, we’re told, was killed by a drunk driver in 1964, while Charles Martin Smith’s Toad “was reported MIA near An Loc in 1965,” and Dreyfuss’ Curt is “now a writer living in Canada,” leading us to wonder if perhaps Curt fled the USA to avoid the draft and Vietnam. (Some of these stories are continued in the regrettable sequel “More American Graffiti.”)

Strangely enough, though, Lucas chose not to tell us what happened to the primary female characters. One can only hope at least Carol and the Blonde in the T-bird found better fates than the likes of Milner and Toad.