Fade in, fade out: addiction, recovery, in American film

• Published in: Phi Kappa Phi forum 2010-06, Vol.90 (2), p.20
• Main Author: Hall, Stefan
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Alcoholism; Cocaine; Crime; Drug addiction; Drug Use; Evaluation; Federal regulation; Foreign Language Films; Fund raising; Government regulation; High School Students; Hit & run accidents; Laws, regulations and rules; Manslaughter; Marijuana; Motion pictures; Movie production; Narcotics; Production and direction; Rating Scales; Secondary school students; Social Attitudes; Social Problems; Substance Abuse; Theater
• ISSN: 1538-5914; 2162-2957

Weed with Roots in Hell (1936) - about a youth who, after trying marijuana at a beach party, becomes pregnant and eventually turns to drug pushing - shows intravenous drug use with vials labeled "lust," "crime," and "sorrow," among others, while larger font advertises "Weird Orgies," "Wild Parties," and "Unleashed Passions!" This propaganda echoes earlier productions that attacked opiates, particularly in the intent to scare off usage in the first place, but overblown depictions remove many from serious consideration. Cheech and Chong influenced many films, for instance, writer/director Richard Linklater's Dazed and Confused ( 1 993), in which small-town Texas high schoolers look to get wasted (or drunk) on graduation day in 1976; the cameo-filled Half Baked (1998). in which dumb stoner roommates raise bail money for their luckless jailed friend by selling pot stolen from a research lab; and Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle (2004) and its sequel Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay (2008), the first about how the nerdy-cool title characters (the former an investment banker and the latter a would-be medical student) get the munchies one Friday night after inhaling, the second about how they are incarcerated when mistaken for terrorists but eventually share a joint with President George W. Bush.