09 August 2009
John Hughes (1950 - 2009)
)Published on August 9th, 2009 @ 01:26:33 pm, using 538 words, 354 views
Ferris Bueller had been insistently popping up in conversation for a week or so before the news broke, really out of nowhere… Robbie decided to show it to her class, and was shocked to learn that none of her students recognized the name Bueller. I mean… come ON! Just the first syllable conjures up the image of Ben Stein as the Economics teacher and his mind-numbing cadence. Bueller… Bueller… Bueller…
Ferris was inexplicably back without warning all the way from 1986. A blast from the past for no identifiable reason. It’s not like it had been on TV recently… More like we (my friends and I) just collectively missed it. It was back in between classes, in conversation, as reenacted quotes, as a choice in facebook quizzes along with every other 80’s teen comedy associated with the name John Hughes. All those clichés, all those predictable endings which in theory I’ve always winced at and yet in practice, watched to exhaustion.
John Hughes’ stories had truth at their core, stemmed from real teenage concerns but made sure you’d always get a glimpse of happiness at the end. You could count on that. The predictability was there for a reason. It was there to blend what you knew to be true with what you thought impossible. The criminal and the princess? A couple? Why not? Jake Ryan actually pining for Samantha Baker just as she did for him? Why not? Keith finally figuring out that Watts was the one? Andie and Blaine getting together in spite of their respective backgrounds? Why the hell not?
What is it in us that insists on believing certain things are impossible? Through his work John Hughes did his best to make sure we understood they aren’t… not necessarily.
All those premises, the coming together of all those different young souls brings a smile to my face. The predictability was there to bring a smile to our faces.
[Click on the thumbnail for a larger view]
The final essay eventually penned by Brian in the last minutes of The Breakfast Club has always struck a chord in me, the ultimate lesson learned, that labels will never live up to the people they are created to pigeonhole.
BRIAN: Dear Mr. Vernon, we accept the fact that we had to sacrifice a whole Saturday in detention for whatever it was we did wrong. But we think you’re crazy to make us write an essay telling you who we think we are. You see us as you want to see us… In the simplest terms, in the most convenient definitions. But what we found out is that each one of us is a brain…
ANDREW: …and an athlete…
ALLISON: …and a basket case…
CLAIRE: …a princess…
BENDER: …and a criminal.
BRIAN: Does that answer your question? Sincerely yours, the Breakfast Club.
I’m due for a fresh viewing. Anyone? Anyone?
Click here to read a lovely tribute to John Hughes’ work.
http://dameonline.blogspot.com/2009/08/one-more-time-my-homage-to-john-hughes.html
Simple Minds - Don’t you forget about me/The Breakfast Club Soundtrack
This post is the creative work of Iris Watts Hirideyo and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
Film, John Hughes, the breakfast club, ferris bueller, pretty in pink, some kind of wonderful, photos, truth, happiness
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