It would, perhaps, be an overstatement to say that John Hughes invented the modern, post-counterculture Hollywood teen comedy (hello, Fast Times at Ridgemont High!). But it still feels as if he did. It feels as if he invented it, patented it, perfected it, abandoned it, then sat back and watched, for two decades, as it imitated (often lamely) what he’d brought to the screen. When Sixteen Candles first came out, in 1984, it so deftly caught the media-wise slang, the music, the “Whatever!” jadedness, the geek chic, the style-conscious you-are-what-you-look-like ‘tude, and — beneath all that surly precocious cynicism — the vestiges of innocence, romance, and longing that gave the then barely named Gen-X its light-and-dark, sweet-and-sour spirit that it seemed as if Hughes must have had an army of secret youth consultants on the set. How did he know all that stuff, and get it so right?
Cameron Crowe, the writer of Fast Times, had drawn on his career as a hip journalist (and was fairly young to begin with). Hughes, by contrast, was in his mid-thirties, a straight family guy who lived in Chicago, but he wasn’t just slumming — he was channeling. His soul seemed to fuse, through some act of cross-generational alchemy, with Molly Ringwald, who turned Samantha, the girl whose sixteenth birthday gets forgotten by her family, into a new kind of reality-based teen heroine — wistful yet eyeball-rolling, an anti-princess princess. Samantha was a junior new-wave thrift-shop feminist, and she had other priorities as well, like always having the perfect cutting remark at her disposal. It was one-upmanship as a way of being. Yet a part of her still wanted that “sweet sixteen” feeling. Through her, and a handful of other characters as well, Hughes not only captured onscreen, but put his own stamp on, the children of Reagan and MTV; he caught the peculiar fusion of romance and indifference, conformity and rebellion, that marked the first American generation to grow up with the consumer culture imprinted on its DNA. (Let’s hear it, too, for what Hughes did with Anthony Michael Hall as the Geek. In Sixteen Candles, he seemed a sweetly appealing, motormouthed, new-style nerd. In hindsight, he’s the guy who was getting ready to take over the world.)
If Hughes made his mark with Sixteen Candles, then he upped the ante a year later with The Breakfast Club — an old script that he claimed he’d pulled out of his drawer, and you could believe it, because the handful of “types” in the movie (jock, brain, depressive raccoon-eyed misfit, etc.) almost seemed to be a variation on the overly schematic teen role-model sociology of something like American Graffiti. Judd Nelson’s mouthy delinquent, in particular, straddled eras; he was one part greaser, one part punk, with one foot in a sitcom. What was new in The Breakfast Club, and so, so fresh, was the way that that library setting looked and felt — like a comfy suburban prison, almost womblike in its concrete spaciousness — and also what happened when the kids sitting around in it one long Saturday-morning detention finally dropped their guards and said what so many kids in high school, deep down, really want to say. Not so much “Can we be friends?” as “How, exactly, did we get to be enemies?” The Simple Minds song “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” may be the single most triumphant, and stirring, use of a pop song in any teen movie. It’s almost shocking in its humanity. And it became John Hughes’ ultimate “statement.”
Maybe that’s why he burned out so quickly as a creative force; it’s as if he’d already said everything he had to say as a filmmaker in his first two movies. I will leave it to others to debate the style-council merits and minor-league charms of Pretty In Pink, which Hughes wrote and produced. Myself, I’ve spent more than 20 years trying to forget the image of Jon Cryer lip-synching to “Try a Little Tenderness,” and unfortunately, that’s still the thing I remember from the movie best. Still, it wasn’t a bad teen flick, and if Hughes already seemed to be repeating himself, there are greater sins for a filmmaker to commit. (He had, in fact, already committed one, and it was called Weird Science, in which Hughes gave in to his splattery arrested id.)
Where I have to part ways with a great many Hughes fans is on Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Sorry, but to me it’s no classic — it’s more like the vengeful fantasy of a brat who can do no wrong, and who lords it over his schoolmates like some combination of Tom Cruise, Sammy Glick, and Eva Peron. In hindsight, Ferris Bueller was Hughes proving that he could touch a chord in his fans by kissing off the real world. And he kept kissing it off. Planes, Trains & Automobiles and Uncle Buck were high-concept insult comedies, with little wit or juice. And by the time Hughes, in 1990, produced Home Alone, that superkid fantasy that turned into a violently sadistic human Road Runner cartoon (not to mention one of the smash hits of all time), it’s as if he’d given up on the very qualities that had first made him a household name.
When I heard that Hughes had died, the news was shocking and a little spooky, not just because he was relatively young, but because, despite working on a few scripts, he’d spent the last decade as such a hermetic, almost vanished figure. In essence, he’d retired from the movie business. Surveying today’s teen culture, with its ever-quickening shifts in fashion and status and technology, he must have felt played out, or even left out. He may well have felt old. Yet for one shining moment in the middle of the 1980s, John Hughes didn’t simply have his finger on the pulse of American teenage life; along with MTV, he seemed to be defining, and directing, it. If that era seems far more innocent now than it did then, that’s in no small part because of how perfectly Hughes mythologized it. He may have flamed out fast, but he will always be remembered as a filmmaker who’s forever young.
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If you watch the Hughes commentary for “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”, you’ll see that yes, he indeed constructed this pushy little a-hole character on purpose. This was no hero. It was a statement on selfishness and teen life, and how his only *true* friend grew frustrated by his recklessness, only – in the end – to shuck his offers to “take the heat” for destroying his father’s car, perhaps because Ferris – in his irresponsibility – shed light on what responsibility actually is.
You know what? I will take Ferris’ “pushy little a-hole” over the self entitled, conscience void, mannerless, clueless 20-somethings of today. Ferris was Mr. Rogers by comparison.
bah. this article is rubbish.
I think you may be a bit rough on Uncle Buck and P,T & A. Both are genuine and funny, and still make me laugh. Planes is perpetually quotable. Chill!
Well said James! Owen, it’s surprising that you point out Ferris as self-involved, as it is becoming harder and harder to read your “reviews” without being subjected to narratives about your feelings and personal experiences that are often not relevant nor interesting. Hughes was an accomplished screenwriter and director, whose movies speak to the generations of teen growing up with the same mix of angst and euphoria that characterizes our adolescence. I for one, will always remember him and his movies, as something great.
I have to say, Owen, up front, that I’ve never liked you much. Your critiques are overly personalized, consciously hipster and seem to pretend at a cineast’s taste that comes off as pretentious. This piece about John just reads as kind of mean spirited to me. I don’t know how old you are but I think you miss some of what John’s films were all about. Weird Science might have been pure Id but it was done in a way I responded to as a kid. Ferris too. As for John being “hermetical” well, only insofar as he didn’t give access to journalists in the same way, didn’t participate in the same game. You make it sound like he was a two trick pony and he wasn’t. Those films, many of which you decry, defined no small part of the 80’s for a lot of us. I’m not going to go off on a screed here (or perhaps I have) but this sort of commentary by you and Lisa is what makes your reviews increasing irrelevant to me and good many of the demographic the magazine seeks to draw. You seem to revel more in the snarky schadenfreude of picking apart movies without ever actually enjoying seeing them. John made movies that were fun while still having an emotional core. he spoke to a generation if not for them and I think your dismissal is at least in poor taste if not tragically unhip.
bravo sir, well played.
owen, you are a hack.
Well said. I agree 100% with what you wrote. It’s a shame people like this get paid to do this kind of work. This people are ignorant and dumb. If you were asked to write about JH it was because he was important to a lot of people and whatever you think of his movies is irrelevant and it shows poor taste to say it on the day of the person’s death. I doubt anybody apart from some poor soul in the obits will be paid to write about your demise.
I agree. Owen is way off base here.
Bravo, James. I am from the generation who grew up with Hughes’ movies, and they had a profound impact on us. “The Breakfast Club” in particular was an uncomfortable mirror of high school cliques, and forced us all to admit that we judged and were judged by others. Deep stuff for the 80’s Me Generation.
James, I just wanted to say that your response truly said it all. JH did speak for a generation. And this generation, now with a wife, two kids and a dog, would rather remember fondly of a more innocent time than to slide into the world of this curmudgeon. I find myself surprisingly affected by this loss. If for no other reason that he reminds me, and so many others, how lucky we were to have experienced our youth in the 80’s.
“how lucky we were to have experienced our youth in the 80’s.”
Wow. Seriously? Let’s see what was this halcyon era you write of: the AIDS crisis, mass/crass consumerism, nuclear buildup, hair metal, synthesizers, truly wretched hairstyles and clothing, and a full decade of watching the hippie kids from the 60’s completely sell out everything they believed in.
Hughes’ movies were awesome, and the man deserves praise. But if you are longing to go back to the 80’s man, call up a counselor b/c your midlife crisis is in full swing.
Well every decade has it’s downs but one thing is certain, each decade that goes by increasingly sucks to grow up in.
But synthesizers are awesome.
Well said James. Ferris Bueller was one of my favorite movies in high school- as an extremely shy kid, Ferris made me feel like I didn’t have to take everything so seriously, & that movie always helped me to relax and have a good laugh when your (what I see now was) average teenage stuff was stressing me out.
Wow, I absolutely agree. I rarely post a comment, but your insight is spot on. EW is my favorite magazine and website, but the section I consistently skip is the movie reviews by Owen & Lisa. They take the true joy out of movie watching and bring a pretentiousness that belies the true spirit of the magazine. Hopefully, they will be replaced with writers who will bring more warmth and humor to the articles and entice readers to read movie reviews.
I completely agree, Nicole. It’s as if they go into the theater WANTING the movie to be poor so they can rip on it. I adore Josh Wolk’s TV recaps and articles – wish he’d write for the movie section!
Agreed with James all the way! This article doesn’t recognize the full scope of what Hughes contributed as a writer/director. His films, especially during his stride in the 80s, were some of the funniest, smartest comedies around. I can watch them over and over again. And for the record, I’m tired of everybody dissing on “Weird Science.” It may have had a silly premise, but it was laugh out-loud escapism. You need that every now and again.
Touche’! Thanks James….you saved me from having to type that all out myself, plus….I would’ve needed to look up the proper spelling of “schadenfreude” on dictionary.com. You nailed it.
Agreed with all, except please do not lump Lisa Schwartzbaum in with Owen Glieberman! I still like her reviews. Owen missed the bus a long time back as far as I am concerned and you said it all re: that.
The problem with Lisa is that she loves to hate men in all of her reviews. It’s so obnoxious. But both she and Owen spend paragraphs speaking theoretically about movies rather than actually reviewing movies!
James, I nominate you to write movie reviews for EW…EW editors are you reading this? I have become more and more disillusioned by the movie reviews in EW and while Owen & Lisa’s opinions may feel relevant to some, might I suggest adding another reviewer that seems to actually enjoy going to the movies?
The really amazing part is you probably got paid for this article.
After reading this piece, I am reminded of the sage observation of Irish author Brendan Behan: “Critics are like eunuchs in a harem; they know how it’s done, they’ve seen it done every day, but they’re unable to do it themselves.”
I think this article is great. You tell the truth about your opinion on some of his movies – you don’t pretend to suddenly like them because Hughes passed away. I think that’s what kinda happened with all the MJ coverage.
I’m not sure this is a fair comparison. I think most people thought about Jackson differently before he died, many believing that he led an oddball life with loads of controversy. With Hughes, a lot of people genuinely have love and affection for his films, especially Ferris, Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club. My opinion of John Hughes was the same on Wednesday as it was yesterday when he died: that he was a great filmmaker that wrote and directed some truly funny and heartwarming movies. Owen is entitled to his opinion, but he does come off as pretentious and a bit fuddy-duddy.
Dunno how you can look at movies ‘from every angle’ with your head so far into your posterior.
Nostalgia Chick may yet get a Pulitzer.
Honestly can say I’d never heard of John Hughes. After reading through this article, I guess I’ve led a charmed life.
I wish I could say I’d never heard of you yus.
Are you being serious?
James – I couldn’t agree more.
Liked the article until the bust on “Ferris”. You were so on with “candles” and “Breakfast” but totally missed Ferris. Ferris is fun, but the movie is really about Cameron. Cameron is the only one whose life is completely changed by that day. As the kid who “rules the school”, I can’t think of one mean spirited thing he did to anyone. Remember every member of every caste in the school loved him…I wish the popular kid in my high would have been like Ferris. And yes – the movie is slightly out of reality from the melodrama of “candles” and “breakfast”…but when he breaks the 4th wall, he lets us in on the joke. Best comedy of the 80’s…period.
“Remember every member of every caste in the school loved him . . .”
Right on, TP! In fact, according to Principal Rooney’s secretary, “They all adore him. They think he’s a righteous dude.” That’s why I think Owen is off the mark here, because popular high schoolers are now depicted as all hipper-than-thou, and Ferris even took time to get the dorky freshman out of summer school! Aaah, a wise man once named Ferris Bueller’s Day Off “the best movie movie of all time,” and I think that’s a perfect description.
I agree, TP, and was really wondering if Owen had actually seen “Ferris”. The movie stresses that Ferris is loved by all, from the geeks to Charlie Sheen’s jailbird. The only person he delighted in tormenting was Rooney, and that was just by being a free spirit. And yeah, the movie is about the transformation of Cameron and even Jeannie. Ferris, even though he’s a well-developed character and charmingly portrayed by Borderick, is just a symbol. Yes, he is the id, but we all have to embrace the id and let it out to play at times. Even Ferris’s father manages to bust a move in his office.
ARE YOU KIDDING ME? REALLY? You should be ashamed of yourself for publishing such a one-sided article full of half truths. John Hughes contributed so much more than you carelessly attributed to him.
What shocking and sad news. Not only because Hughes was a favorite of mine, but because he was a husband and father. Obviously deepest sympathies go out to his family.
Owen definitely nails exactly what Hughes’ teen movies meant to Hollywood and to the culture. I also disagree about “Ferris,” “Weird Science” and “Planes, Trains and Automobiles” (which happens to be a movie I love). I also ardently object to this idea that Hughes became a hermit and felt “left out” or old. Hughes simply didn’t want to make or write movies anymore. He wasn’t booted out of Hollywood or anything. He was simply done with them — and not the other way around. He was one of the most profitable filmmakers around. The idea that he felt times had simply passed him by doesn’t make sense because he long abandoned writing about teenagers. He had entered into that second phase of his career where he was writing children/family movies almost exclusively.
I was too young to catch his ’80s movies when they were in the theaters, but they still feel very much a part of my youth. I cherish “The Breakfast Club.”
This is truly a sad day.
I agree. I think Owen is most off base when he talks about Hughes’ supposed loneliness and isolation. It’s as if he only included it because he felt it made this article more dimensional. Hughes was involved in films all the way up until the recent film with Owen Wilson (Drillbit? i think was the title?). Where does Owen get the idea that Hughes was a lonely man who was watching the world pass him by? As if the man was in his 90s or something.
What a joke this article was. To criticize and belittle Hughes’s work when he has just died is completely classless.
Cmon this bonehead “critic” liked Transformers 2 and gave it a B…A freaking B…That movie was the biggest piece of crap on the planet and you wanna rip on Ferris…I cannot believe you get paid to write this garbage..