Analysis Of The Breakfast Club By John Hughes

“Sincerely yours, The Breakfast Club.” Iconic words from an extremely well-known and highly praised movie. The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Sixteen Candles, Pretty in Pink… These are just a few teen movies that were directed and/or produced by the brillant John Hughes. Films such as these helped to change the way that teen movies were filmed, and the culture of teens was portrayed, forever. John Hughes was born on February 18, 1950 in Lansing, Michigan. After growing up near Detroit, Hughes moved to Chicago, Illinois, at the age of 13, where he lived on the outskirts of an affluent suburban neighborhood. After graduating high school, he moved to Tucson, Arizona where he attended the University. However, Hughes dropped out after

It plays into the “you just can’t make this stuff up” way of thinking. Another key part of the success of John Hughes’s films came from his breaking away from stereotypes. Back then, the teen movie culture was riddled with stereotypes, exaggerated left and right. Hughes broke from this pattern, a clear example of this being The Breakfast Club. He portrays the students as different, subtly hinting at their divergent backgrounds through tiny clues, yet they come together over the course of the afternoon, realizing that they are, in fact, very similar. None of the students end up fitting the mold that most viewers quickly established for them, or that they establish for each other, based off of their clothes, their parents, their choice of seat in the library, and other aspects of their character. They all have problems, they all have reasons for behaving the way that they do. The movie famously quotes: “...We think it’s 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, the most convenient definitions. But what we found out is that each of us is a brain, and an athlete, and a basket case, a princess, and a criminal. Does that answer your

He treated them with respect and dignity, giving validity to the teenage struggle, instead of brushing it aside as lightweight in comparison to the “adult world.” He also goes into the issues that arise with parental pressure, and too much of it. This is something that most teen movies never touch on. The parents may nag, they may ground the kids, or they may not even play a major role in the film. The audience may never know how the teens feel about their parents or their expectations. Yet, it is a very important part of the transition to adulthood. As it is seen in The Breakfast Club, when “the brain,” Brian, receives an ‘F’ on one of his shop assignments. The entire reason that he is in detention is because he brought a flare gun to school and it was discovered in his locker. He quotes, “I can't have an F, I can't have it and I know my parents can't have it. Even if I aced the rest of the semester, I'm still only a B. And everything's ruined for me.” With this, even though the parents of the detainees are not present in the film, we can see the themes of oppression and judgement carried throughout the film. That desperate need to fit in, not only with teen standards, but with the standards that parents hold up for their