When it comes to making out, whenever possible, put on Side 1 of Led Zeppelin IV

And because he was so young when he graduated from high school (see Almost Famous) - he was able to go undercover as a 22 year old and re-enroll in high school.



Crowe has said he just wrote down everything he saw and heard.

He changed the name of the school, its location and the names of the students and teachers with whom he lived. The events and the dialog, however, were real.

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the most honest and realistic high school movie

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Superbad is on?

We regularly fell out a van in high school at the end of lunch period just like Spicoli!! It wasn't a VW van, but when the doors would open the smoke billowed out and then four or five of us would roll out

I went to a very small "pay to pass" private high school in New Orleans in the late 70's after getting kicked out of a well known Catholic HS and FTARH is about as close as possible to being my life for 3 years. I smoked with my teacher..

Greetings fellow Golden Eagle.

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Near the beginning of the movie, right after Mr. Hand sends Spicoli to the front office for being late to class, Mr. Hand passes out the class schedule of quizzes. After the paper is passed out, the students put the page up to their noses and deeply inhale. This was a popular school ritual of the '60s, '70s and early '80s as photocopying machines were very expensive, so spirit duplicators were used.

The spirit duplicators used a colored wax as the "ink" and a noxious solvent as a transfer agent to impress the ink on the paper. These solvents sometimes took a long time to dry, hence the students' use of these solvents as a short-term high.

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According to Amy Heckerling, Sean Penn and pals were actually smoking marijuana in the van as they exited for the prom.

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The movies tried it's hardest to be as real as possible:

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Prior to the film's 19 August 1982 Los Angeles release, a news story reported that the 5 July 1982 Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) bulletin had granted "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" an X-rating, due to a love scene between Stacy Hamilton and Mike Damone, which featured full-frontal male nudity.

As the picture was "the first major studio film in some time" to be given an X-rating, Universal agreed to edit the scene, allowing the MPAA to re-issue the film as R. Jennifer Jason Leigh explained that teenage test audiences had found the scene "too graphic," and the actress expressed her disappointment that the re-cut version eliminated the sense of awkward hesitancy between the two characters, who weren't ready for sex.

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Andy Rathbone was the student Cameron Crowe based Mark "Rat" Ratner on. Rathbone was known as "the rat" in high school, and was initially extremely upset at the portrayal of his character. He said that Crowe only accentuated his bad attributes and gave cool things he had done to other characters, such as ordering a pizza during class - that was done by Jeff Spicoli in the film but done by Rathbone in real life.

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According to the Tampa Bay Times, Linda's nude scene was voted Top Nude Scene of All Time by Mr. Skin.

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The scene where Linda instructs Stacy how to give a blowjob originally took place in a hot tub with both girls naked. This was changed to avoid getting an X rating.

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When Mike Damon gives Rat his "five point plan" he says, "And five, now this is the most important, Rat. When it comes down to making out, whenever possible, put on side one of Led Zeppelin IV." However the sound track plays "Kashmir" which is not on Led Zeppelin IV, but Physical Graffiti. This is because the producers couldn't get the rights to Led Zeppelin IV.

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Immediately plays song from side 2 of Physical Graffiti.

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See, I didn't know they couldn't get the rights to Led Zeppelin IV. (they probably wanted to play Stairway in the movie.)

Which could be seen as a makeout song.

So I always took it as Rat was nervous about the date and so stupid, he plays Kashmir. Which is the opposite of a smooth ballad.

They had to have lowered those chairs in the movie to make them look like kids ill-equipped to be on a date and accentuate the nervousness.



I mean look at them compared to the people in the background. That waitress looks like a giant. It really makes Rat look even more uncool.

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I went to a very small "pay to pass" private high school in New Orleans in the late 70's after getting kicked out of a well known Catholic HS and FTARH is about as close as possible to being my life for 3 years. I smoked with my teacher..

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Ridgewood Prep..?