THE BREAKFAST CLUB (1985) ¢ ¢ ¢ 1/2
D: John Hughes
Emilio Estevez, Molly Ringwald, Judd Nelson,
Ally Sheedy, Anthony Michael Hall, Paul Gleason
Five high school classmates spend a Saturday in detention, under the sometimes watchful eye of a dictatorial teacher. The kids are transparent types: the jock (Emilio Estevez), the brain (Anthony Michael Hall), the princess (Molly Ringwald), the juvenile delinquent (Judd Nelson) and the kook (Ally Sheedy), and if their dialogue seems a little too earnest and obvious, it's also a fair representation of the way teenagers think and talk. The whole point, the way they see it, is that the stereotypes don't always fit, especially when they're projected on people who are still in the process of defining themselves. The resolution's a lot more convenient than credible, but Hughes does keep the conversation lively, and the young brat-packers pull it off. The standout is Sheedy, playing a willfully eccentric social outcast who's easily the coolest person in the room, only nobody's figured that out yet.
John Hughes
(1950-2009)
