Talk:American Graffiti

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the American Graffiti article.
This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.
New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help.

Article policies

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: 1

American Graffiti has been listed as one of the Media and drama good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
February 25, 2008	Good article nominee	Listed
May 4, 2008	Featured article candidate	Not promoted
May 15, 2008	Peer review	Reviewed

Current status: Good article

Film: American

	Film portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Film. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see lists of open tasks and regional and topical task forces. To use this banner, please refer to the documentation. To improve this article, please refer to the guidelines.FilmWikipedia:WikiProject FilmTemplate:WikiProject Filmfilm articles
	This article is supported by the American cinema task force.
	This article has an archived A-Class review.
	This article has an archived peer review.

United States: Cinema Low‑importance

	United States portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject United States, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of topics relating to the United States of America on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the ongoing discussions. Template Usage Articles Requested! Become a Member Project Talk Alerts United StatesWikipedia:WikiProject United StatesTemplate:WikiProject United StatesUnited States articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.
	Film portal This article is supported by WikiProject Film - American cinema task force (assessed as High-importance).

Library of Congress Low‑importance

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Library of Congress, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the Library of Congress on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Library of CongressWikipedia:WikiProject Library of CongressTemplate:WikiProject Library of CongressLibrary of Congress articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the importance scale.

Comedy Mid‑importance

	Comedy portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Comedy, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of comedy on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ComedyWikipedia:WikiProject ComedyTemplate:WikiProject ComedyComedy articles
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

California: San Francisco Bay Area Low‑importance

	California portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject California, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the U.S. state of California on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.CaliforniaWikipedia:WikiProject CaliforniaTemplate:WikiProject CaliforniaCalifornia articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.
	San Francisco Bay Area portal This article is supported by San Francisco Bay Area task force (assessed as Mid-importance).

A-Class review for WikiProject Films

This review is transcluded from Wikipedia:WikiProject Films/Assessment/American Graffiti. The edit link for the section below can be used to add comments to the review.

American Graffiti

The following discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Failed Girolamo Savonarola (talk) 19:28, 12 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Nominator: Wildroot (talk) 23:49, 13 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I am nominating this article for A-Class review because after doing both a comprehensive and exhaustive rewrite, this article has greatly improved in the span of a couple of weeks. Suggestions would be great. ~~Also, I intend to replace the IMDb citation from the Awards section.~~ I also plan on finish writing the Cast descriptions, even if they aren't required (see 300 (film)#Cast). Wildroot (talk) 23:49, 13 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The Intro is too long, really pushing hard against the four paragraph limit with really big paragraphs, instead of being a nice comfortable two or three paragraphs. Also it would be good to include some of cast information inline in the plot summary because formatting it as Character Name ([Actor Name]) make it much easier to follow what is happening. None of that would probably stop this from getting A Class but I hope you'll consider making the extra effort to make the article the best it can be. (I'll try and come back and take a look at cleaning it up myself.) -- Horkana (talk) 05:48, 2 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

pharoe's car

Can anyone tell me the make. year and model of the car the Pharoe's had in the movie? Thanks, rck129@yahoo.com (please send to this email addy) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rck129 (talk • contribs) 14:04, 12 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The Axle Trick

There is an episode of Leave it To Beaver where one of the kids gets a car (Model T, how old is this?). I think it was Eddie Haskell. Anyway, he's so annoying that the other two older kids decide to pull a trick. They chain the rear axle to a tree so that he'll go screeching out out the driveway and jerk to a stop. This being sitcom TV, all we see it the two boys watching from behind a bush, then sound effects, then the rear axle with chain rolls into the picture and Eddie whining "Daaaaad!"

So I assume this trick was a common urban legend of the time.

59 - 62 discrepancy

The friends were from the Class of 59 but the movie is set in 1962. Could someone edit the article to explain why the gap? Comet Tuttle (talk) 21:22, 25 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

License plate

Apparently one of the cars in this film has license plate THX138, possibly as a reference to Lucas's earlier film THX 1138 - can anybody find a WP:RS so that this may be added? --Redrose64 (talk) 12:40, 8 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion pertaining to non-free image(s) used in article

A cleanup page has been created for WP:FILMS' spotlight articles. One element that is being checked in ensuring the quality of the articles is the non-free images. Currently, one or more non-free images being used in this article are under discussion to determine if they should be removed from the article for not complying with non-free and fair use requirements. Please comment at the corresponding section within the image cleanup listing. Before contributing the discussion, please first read WP:FILMNFI concerning non-free images. Ideally the discussions pertaining to the spotlight articles will be concluded by the end of June, so please comment soon to ensure there is clear consensus. --Happy editing! Nehrams2020 (talk • contrib) 05:17, 20 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Legacy

Would American Graffiti be considered the first of the films about the end of high school? Would movies like "Can't Hardly Wait" be inspired by American Graffiti? 158.80.40.2 (talk) 16:36, 6 June 2011 (UTC)amyanda2000[reply]

I have tried to Edit the "Legacy" section of American Graffiti, but my edit's disappear quite quickly. What I wanted to add to the "Legacy" section is that guitarist Jeff Beck - renowned through out the world as one of the greatest rock guitarists - is also a huge Hot-Rod enthusiast. He builds his own cars and has built a yellow Deuce replica complete w/ the THX 138 license plate. On his 1999 album titled: Who Else! - he has a song titled: THX138

You can find Jeff on You Tube discussing this and showing his car off, just search on YT for: Jeff Beck - Music and Cars Part 1. DrDeath26 (talk) 00:30, 15 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

New American Graffiti Jeff's All Graffiti All The Time

I would like to add an external link to the American Graffiti page. If someone(a human not an automated machine)would take the time to look at this site with the facts and pictures It would be a great addition to this page. there are other blogs listed so that excuse doesn't work. http://jeffsallgraffitiallthetime.blogspot.com 67.184.246.44 (talk) 21:18, 6 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Dubious claim

The claim that ILM enhanced the film for its BR release, deleted from the George Lucas article on Wikipedia, has popped up again here, again without a source. If a source cannot be provided I will revisit and amend the text.Theonemacduff (talk) 16:40, 31 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

If it's unsourced, there is no reason not to remove it. I would think such a claim, if true, could be sourced faily easily. This is not an obscure film, a great deal has been written about it, same goes for ILM and George Lucas, and their activities are well documented. ---The Old Jacobite_{The '45} 19:10, 31 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Your challenge is as unsourced as his claim. It goes against the rule "assume good faith". The degradation of Wikipedia reliability, depth, and massive loss of editors directly caused by your kind of unsourced bad faith challenges. The lengthy list of citations in the articles, often a list longer than the article itself, shows most of your bad faith challenges to be sourced on utter ignorance, and are merely unnecessary bad faith tasking of good faith editors to find sources. Not that you have any published challenge. Just any anonymous troll on the internet looking for attention.

98.164.76.40 (talk) 14:09, 9 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Resurrecting a 9 year old discussion just to make a point - especially when it's no longer applicable because the article has changed so much - might also be considered troll-like behaviour... Chaheel Riens (talk) 11:22, 11 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

No mention of Falfa's '55 Chevy

I am new to this page, but since hot rods are such a prominent theme in this film, I think it's worth mentioning that Bob Falfa drives a '55 Chevy. I suggest adding it to the Plot section, since the lead-up to Falfa's race against Milner's deuce coupe, not to mention the race itself, is such an important part of the plot. Not sure how best to do that though, so I am open to suggestions. (Also of note is the fact that the '55 Chevy Harrison Ford drove in the movie was the same car featured in Two-Lane Blacktop.)Pistongrinder (talk) 16:50, 25 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 2 external links on American Graffiti. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add {{cbignore}} after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add {{nobots|deny=InternetArchiveBot}} to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

Y An editor has reviewed this edit and fixed any errors that were found.

If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers. —^{cyberbot II}_{Talk to my owner:Online} 21:24, 28 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Baxter book source cites inaccuracies

Made changes on 28 Oct 2015 to certain info and cites to the Baxter book. Found at library hardback copy of the Baxter book and checked dubious allegations and cites from it included in this article. Baxter's unauthorized biography of Lucas is without any source citations for its claims, making them dubious at best. Even if claims from the unsourced book are to be included in this article, cite-checking the book (p 129-130 discusses gossip about conduct of the actors during filming) confirms several are misstated, not actually mentioned in the book or otherwise inaccurately cited in this article. Ex -Book doesn't claim actors were drunk between takes; doesn't mention any alleged bar fight involving Ford or his being arrested. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mmlesp (talk • contribs) 20:46, 28 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 3 external links on American Graffiti. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true or failed to let others know (documentation at {{Sourcecheck}}).

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 19:29, 13 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 4 external links on American Graffiti. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0%2C%2C20232072%2C00.html
Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0%2C9171%2C907741%2C00.html
Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120304064941/http://awardsdatabase.oscars.org/ampas_awards/DisplayMain.jsp?curTime=1210371413986 to http://awardsdatabase.oscars.org/ampas_awards/DisplayMain.jsp?curTime=1210371413986
Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0%2C9171%2C914964%2C00.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 04:48, 30 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Set in Modesto?

This might have been discussed years ago, I know. I have heard that American Graffiti was filmed in Modesto – in fact, the Mel's diner was still there when I was in the city in the mid-1990's – but the intro says that the film is "set" in Modesto, which is another thing entirely. It has been a while since I saw the movie, but I don't remember that the city was ever identified in the film, or even that it was supposed to be in California. Shocking Blue (talk) 08:19, 2 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on American Graffiti. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20080509145340/http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/luc0int-1 to http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/luc0int-1

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 17:42, 3 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

John and Carol.

Carol was 12 not 16. She was dumped on John as a prank by her older sister's friends and manipulated John into driving her round by threatening to report him for attempted rape.

John resented her and at one point reduced her to tears, after which he treated her more sympathetically. She was not "fond of him". She was more intent on the experience of being out on the town and was angry at the way he treated her as the child she was. Eventually he scared her into letting him take her home after he made suggestive approaches to her. He then gave her a keepsake and an innocent friendly kiss on the head. 90.248.76.197 (talk) 22:30, 16 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Debbie last's name

I do read some online sources which identified Debbie's last name "Dunham," but they are likely false, as the trailer identified her as "Debbie Medway."]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZ9Gp6Qc8LQ&t=56s]Speakfor (talk) 17:32, 31 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]