Review of Slacker (1990) by Sujit O — 02 Jan 2015

A film widely acclaimed to be the defining movie of the 90's similar to 'Taxi Driver' of the 70's. Slacker shows in many continuous sequences the life of "Slackers" who have trouble playing any real valuable part in society. The 'Slackers' vary from young to old, male and female and all forms possible.

There is no apparent storyline and I have to agree that you do manage to lose interest during a few of the not so interesting character studies. But some of the characters really do have some incredible and eye opening stories to tell. For example, the initial sequence acted by Linklater himself is one of the best sequences in the movie where he describes a dream he has during the journey on his way to the city.

Linklater has a special talent for writing which manages to stick with philosophical topics but yet not make the content dry. This along with his experienced knowledge in film history making himself an incredible director is shown clearly in his different, risky and extremely creative debut into feature films after 9 long years of learning films and making short films. Richard Linklater is a true inspiration and I'm sure will go down as one of the great geniuses in film history!