American Graffiti (George Lucas, 1973)

Lucas's second feature, based on the setting of his coming of age in a nondescript early '60s small town, offers no inkling at all of the globe-striding behemoth he was to become with Star Wars. This is both a good thing, as there is no budget to run roughshod over the script and the dialogue is natural, and then again not good at all, as it manages tediousness without any excuses.
Bizarrely, it was nominated for the year's Best Picture Oscar, which is surely testament to how many Americans will have found a resonance with their own youths in dead-end middle America in the gap between the bright-eyed optimism of the '50s and the impending arrival of Vietnam, civil rights and the concomitant counter-culture, which then upset the apple cart for good . But to the external eye, it just consists of a string of mildly amusing scenes spread over a night of minor comings-to between aimless kids, driving around and around endlessly because there's nothing else to do.

5/10