Everybody Wants Some!!

Release Date: March 30th, 2016
Running Time: 116 minutes
Written & Directed by: Richard Linklater
Starring: Blake Jenner, Glen Powell, Zoey Deutch, Temple Baker, Wyatt Russell, J. Quinton Johnson, Ryan Guzman, Tyler Hoechlin

Richard Linklater's Everybody Wants Some!! was described in its ad campaign as "the spiritual sequel" to cult hit Dazed and Confused (1993), one of my favourite films of all time. While Dazed revolves around high school students in a 1976 Texas town, Everybody focuses on Texas college students in 1980. They're not the same characters that we got to know and love in Dazed, but they're the appropriate age that those characters would be in Everybody's time setting. As such, it certainly delivers as a sequel to Dazed, in spirit, as both are comedies with little story arc that instead focus on comical conversations and situations, effectively capturing the tone and attitude of the time and characters depicted.

Both films also showcase ensemble casts of unknown young actors, several of whom from Dazed later became stars—such as Matthew McConaughey, Parker Posey, Ben Affleck, and Milla Jovovich. It's doubtful if Everybody Wants Some!! will achieve such revered cult film status as the nearly perfect Dazed and Confused, but it nonetheless has its moments. 

A common quality of Linklater films is a unique engagement with time, as several of his pictures take place over 24 hours, like Dazed and Confused and his earlier cult favourite Slacker (1991). His trilogy Before Sunrise, Before Sunset, and Before Midnight not only each take place over 24 hours, but also 9 years apart, in movie time and real time. And his groundbreaking Boyhood was filmed over a 12-year period. Everybody chronicles three days leading up to the first day of college for the protagonist, 18-year-old Jake Bradford (Blake Jenner). In this respect Linklater has said that he considers Everybody also somewhat of a sequel to Boyhood, as that film ends with its protagonist arriving at college—just where this one begins.  

Jake rolls up to his residence on August 28th, 1980, with a countdown clock periodically appearing throughout the film showing the number of days and hours, then minutes, before class starts. His house is one of two reserved by the college on the edge of campus for its star baseball team. In the opening minutes we meet Jake's eight roommates and his next door teammates, ranging from freshmen like him to seniors. The fictional Southeast Texas Cherokees, they're one of the best college baseball teams in the country. Since the college's other sports teams don't compare, the Cherokee players are popular on campus, a definite asset in achieving their main goal besides winning baseball games—getting chicks.

Shenanigans are immediately underway as the group cruise around, hit on girls, talk baseball, and drink beer at one of several local bars. Primal masculine youth characteristics abound as the macho posturing of young American males is displayed by most members of the group. They constantly put each other down with homophobic slurs, make jokes about each other's inadequate penis size while bragging about their own, boast about sexual exploits with young women, drink alcohol, and smoke weed. The bullshitting is relentless as they carry on pranks and stunts to no end. And there's a hazing procedure for the freshmen, as in Dazed, although not nearly as much time is dedicated to it here. Despite all this, there's an assumed competitive comradery; they're bonded by their identities as baseball players and take the prospect of victory on the field very seriously. One of the veteran players tells Jake that all the merciless ribbing off the field is what makes them such a good team on it. 

Everybody has much in common with numerous run-of-the-mill teen/college sex comedies, but there are enough esoteric, idiosyncratic elements to register it just a notch higher. While initially the guys are largely indistinguishable from each other as typical fratboy dufuses, distinct personalities emerge as we get to know them; there's a cowboy hat-wearin' hillbilly, a bearded pot-smokin' hippie philosopher, an ultra-conceited goofball, etc. But these "types" are not overplayed to clichéd proportions, and we can see ourselves in aspects of all of them. This is a quality that Dazed also excellently displays, presenting a range of individual characteristics within a larger framework of shared cultural commonalities, and despite over-the-top kookiness in many respects, it still feels pretty realistic. We know guys like this. The hyper-masculine posing rings true of young males in their time and place; stuck between boyhood and manhood, independent for the first time in their lives, their places secured in sports-obsessed American society first and foremost as baseball players.

Dazed is relatively ensemble-focused, with few characters given much more attention than any other. Everybody, however, while still distributing focus amongst the dozen or so main characters, revolves more so around Jake. The film starts and ends with him. He's one of the more reserved of the bunch, with everyman qualities and less macho posing than most of them. This makes Jake more relatable than some of the others, and so a good choice by Linklater to center on him as an anchor for the audience.

Many characters initially come off as obnoxious dolts—egotistical boneheads constantly engaging in comic buffoonery. Throughout the film I found myself wanting them to show more intelligent, sophisticated dimensions, to drop the barriers of their social facades as they get to know each other. This eventually does happen, to a degree, as the ensemble narrows to focus on Jake and the three or four teammates he bonds with most, increasing their likeability. But I wanted this a bit more than is delivered. Not that I needed any sentimental heart-to-heart conversations about serious life issues, because that would've been corny and out of place in a film of this kind. But a touch more authentic bonding might've been good to take the edge off the rough-and-tumble college party debauchery and sexism.

This is something that Dazed does better; despite all its zany high school antics, characters' neuroticisms and emotionally honest moments emerge throughout the hilarity. However, this actually makes sense in context of the two films—in Dazed they knew each other better, having spent several years in school together and all living in the same town, whereas here they're from all over and are a little older and more cynical. Perhaps another reason there aren't more displays of emotional sensitivity is that the central characters are almost exclusively male. The one exception is Beverly (Zoey Deutch), a theater major who Jake meets on campus and pursues a romance with. There are lots of females in the film, but they're mostly nameless sex object counterparts to the male leads, with very few lines. In Dazed, however, the female characters are given nearly as much attention as the males. Here it seems the machismo is a front for some deeper fears and insecurities, so it would've increased the humanistic qualities to see that complexity displayed more. I guess this is kind of the point though, and maybe there's a deeper commentary on American masculinity than is immediately apparent.

The plot is loose; less a typical story arc and more so a series of glimpses into comedic conversations about trivial things, reminiscent of Dazed in this way but a touch less successful at it. In Dazed, virtually every scene captures some potent aspect of teenager attitudes, with many hilarious lines now solidified in the American comedy film canon. There are a few such highlights in Everybody though, such as when four of the guys sit around doing bong hits and listening to records. It's a scene that deftly displays classic stoner conversation, with topics such as The Twilight Zone, corporate America, Carl Sagan, Mayans, and language being "a construct".

Various cultural scenes are looked at, as the young men open to the world. College partying, sex, drinking, pot-smoking, and the sports world intersect with the disco scene, honky-tonk line dancing, and punk rock culture. Even HipHop is touched on (as much as it could be at its limited stage of evolution in 1980 Texas) when five of the guys enthusiastically rap along to Sugarhill Gang's 1979 hit "Rapper's Delight" while cruising in their car, in a segment reminiscent of the Wayne's World "Bohemian Rhapsody" lip-sync scene. And yet another cultural scene is glimpsed when Jake and his new friends attend a bizarre masquerade party thrown by the theater and dance majors, complete with theatrical performances, outlandish decorations, and extravagant costumes. It's a memorable, visually vibrant scene that turns into an all-nighter for Jake and company. At one point, while Jake and his new buddy Finn are at a punk rock concert, he claims that he thinks he's having an identity crisis as in the last three days they've attended a disco, a cowboy bar, and now are "punks for a night". Says Jake, "It sorta begs the question about who we really are", to which Finn responds, "I'll tell you who we really are: we're a couple of guys who are gonna do whatever it takes to get laid". And so there you have it. Maybe seems a bit shallow, a bit simple-minded—and maybe it is. But these are 18- to 22-year-old 1980 Texas college dudes, so it's also honest. 

Linklater was born and raised in Texas, attended high school and college there in the '70s and '80s, and played baseball for his college team, so it's safe to assume that some aspects of both Dazed and Confused and Everybody Wants Some!! are autobiographical. This lends authenticity to both pictures, as their creator is confident and knowledgable about his subjects. The time setting is effectively captured by the attitudes of the main characters (several of whom sport moustaches and shaggy hair), style of dress, music, cars, and other details.

Just as Dazed and Confused takes its title from a Led Zeppelin song, similarly Everybody Wants Some!! takes its name from a Van Halen song. The great soundtrack is actually more diverse than the Dazed soundtrack which features primarily classic rock, whereas Everybody ranges through punk, disco, funk, rock, and new wave, with bands as varied as Parliament and Devo. And in addition to "Rapper's Delight", an original old school-style rap song is performed by the film's key players, in character, over the closing credits. Self-referential, and shot like a music video, it captures the film's fun tone and is an amusing way to end it.

Overall, the movie is a well-executed portrayal of college life for the average American male in a time transitioning from the dour '70s to the decadent '80s. While much of the characters' behaviour and dialogue is lewd and unsophisticated, this somehow adds to the film's charm as a comedically exaggerated portrayal of a specific time, place, and culture. Like in Dazed and Confused, nothing really happens. But this is also part of the appeal, as the film bucks formulaic cinematic storytelling conventions. Linklater has always done this; making something magical and captivating out of small-budget, independent productions that often feature people just walking around and talking. And there's something refreshing and thoroughly compelling about how he does it. Everybody Wants Some!! doesn't have as many memorable lines as Dazed and Confused, and maybe the characters won't end up being as legendary, but it's still a solidly entertaining entry into Linklater's repertoire that left me with something to think about.
Rating (out of 5): ★★★½
• Nik Dobrinsky / Boy Drinks Ink
April 26th, 2016