Practically everyone’s teenage years sucked and to add insult to injury Hollywood made some of the crappiest movies about the subject matter. My biggest gripes were always casting and location. Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Welcome Back Kotter are easy examples on the casting complaint: people in their early to mid twenties portraying high school students. I know the main argument is labor laws (actors under 18 have numerous restrictions) but it always morphs into Hollywood injecting its unrealistic ideals of teenage girls with fully developed bodies, boys who need to shave every morning and both genders lacking the awkwardness of the age. As for location, having 75 percent set in California is another one of Hollywood’s lazy conceits: Grease (the movie) was retooled to take place there, not the Midwest which is where the musical had Rydell set. Hollywood does grant an exception for New York (City) because many of its participants did come from there and its the only other destination that “doesn’t make them puke,” hence Head of the Class, The Cosby Show and Square Pegs (yet they were all shot in California).
Being born and raised a Midwesterner with stints in Texas and North Dakota it was easy to be irked at this dissonance or experience feelings of inferiority for living in “flyover country” like over 80 percent of the country.
Then John Hughes’ first movie about teenage Sixteen Candles appeared. It was set in the Chicago ‘burbs and several key cast members were actually the same ages as their characters! Holy Crap! What a crazy concept! Well, I didn’t get to see it in theaters when it debuted in 1984 with the Indiana transition. I probably didn’t express any interest since I recall it being marketed as a standard Teen-Gross-Out-Sex-Romp film, you know, yet another Animal House knockoff with teenagers. Besides, the new Indiana Jones movie was more my speed. Then came the North Dakota move so I missed out on The Breakfast Club in theaters which disappointed me because he used three actors who were too old: Estevez (23), Nelson (24) and Sheedy (23); they were better choices for a movie about graduate school. Still, I did enjoy these two flicks when they were shown ad nauseum on HBO/Showtime. John Hughes had a gift for capturing the zeitgeist of Eighties teenagers. At least I felt he had it right; there was angst but no save-the-planet, self-righteous bullshit like the boring Hippies who preceded me.
Weird Science coming to the only theater near Beulah (North Dakota) was a major event for my friends and me. Hell, we went twice that weekend. Despite this flick being a geeky teenage boys fantasy, most of it rang true regarding Gary and Wyatt’s high-school plight. Pretty in Pink has the most special place in my heart because my father went through all the trouble to make a weekend trip into Bismarck so I could see it during its opening weekend. I think he knew I had a big crush on Molly Ringwald too (hey, we’re the same age, I thought I had a shot). I consider Ferris Bueller’s Day Off the final chapter of his Eighties Teenager Tales Quintet. It’s also the movie I like the least. Being a square-ass who only skipped one class in high school (to cram for a Chemistry exam I still failed), I found Ferris to be a smug d-bag who deserved to get busted by Principal Rooney. Some Kind of Wonderful is excluded from his Quintet due to it taking place in LA.
By the time Wonderful appeared, I was in college and Hughes shifted his subject matters. There I thought he was pretty hit or miss. More often it was miss: Planes, Trains & Automobiles (sappy, predictable); The Great Outdoors (mediocre) and the worn-out Vacation sequels. These having funny moments; it was probably an omen this earlier this week when a co-worker and I were joking about the “Those aren’t two pillows!” scene; yet the overall experiences were disposable. He has two bright spots: the biographical She’s Having a Baby (my absolute favorite movie of his) and Uncle Buck.
The Nineties weren’t kind. Hughes finished up doing awful, sickening schlock targeted at (dumb) kids: Curly Sue, Dennis the Menace, Beethoven, Baby’s Day Out, Home Alone (all three), 101 Dalmatians plus the remakes of Miracle on 34th Street and Flubber. I was shocked to see he did the screenplay for Just Visiting (the American version of the French hit Les Visiteurs). Afterwards he had dropped out of sight, writing scripts under the pen name Edmond Dantes. Maybe he had enough money to retire and hide out north of Chicago.
One strength that was consistent of his movies were the soundtracks. In the early Eighties, record companies perfected a cynical strategy to sell more albums through films. They still do. It’s why they’re packed with moldy oldies and other crap to ruin the one or two good tracks (easily fixed through iTunes). Hughes’ stuff was a frequent exception. Pretty in Pink reflected the song choices of Andie’s character, She’s Having a Baby has a his and her side with original tracks courtesy of XTC and Kate Bush (moving a mountain takes less effort than getting Andy Partridge to write a song for you), Planes, Trains & Automobiles has a city and country side; the list could go on. His soundtracks gave hit song opportunities to OMD, Yello and Simple Minds for mainstream radio; Flesh for Lulu, Dave Wakeling, and Oingo Boingo in smaller circles. How I wished he would’ve pushed to do a proper album with Sixteen Candles. I remember pausing the video tape to see what was played via the movie’s end credits which was 21 songs, most of which were great (Tim Finn, Thompson Twins, Stray Cats, Oingo Boingo and Altered Images for a start) and then saw it only had a five-song EP.
Overall, I am sad to see John Hughes pass. I only hope he knew how much he entertained and aided the rest of teenage America during the Eighties. Now to wait and see if the Alamo Drafthouse will be piecing together a tribute/filmfest to him.
