Slacker
The Age
Friday June 19, 2009
Slacker 96 mins, M Hopscotch (1991)RICHARD Linklater's landmark ultra-low-budget independent film is a glorious swirl of nutty ideas and left-field musings as a vaguely connected group of aimless characters in Austin, Texas, share their thoughts with each other. The highlights include a girl trying to sell Madonna's Pap smear, a UFO enthusiast, a pamphleteer who proclaims how "terrorism's the surgical strike capability of the oppressed", and an elderly man who befriends a home invader and tells him his biggest regret in life was not being home the day Charles Whitman went on his shooting spree. This was Linklater's second feature film and the one often credited with coining the term "slacker" to define the new post-yuppie generation of highly educated, highly articulate 20-somethings with no life plan other than to kill time. A prime example of a film that rewards you the more you listen to it.
© 2009 The Age
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